rdm as DD?

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: rdm as DD?

If there is a BRD in the Colbri party and the RDM is taking the Melee Songs... maybe the damage output from the RDM is decent.

Seriously, if MP is not a concern in the Colbri burn party, I would ask the RDM to melee.

Often, though, RDM is called upon to be the sole healer of the PT in a colibri PT and as a BRD or COR, I can't tell you how irritating it is to watch someone get a buff I didn't intend for them. Both of those jobs are reliant on the cooperation of the party to stay divided in two parts unless there's a need on the frontline for what the backline gets (meaning PLD, BLU, DRK). And when that happens, even then I die a little on the inside because it also usually means lower EXP per hour.

But then, those are the players a COR and BRD look to a RDM to cover, I'd only consider MP buffing PLD, BLU and DRK if we didn't have a RDM. We're not passing the buck, its not that we don't want to refresh PLD, DRK and BLU, but that they can gain even greater benefit from melee buffs, which can also be buffs that support tanking and reduce damage taken.

Its not about RDM going "Oh, I'm fine, I can Refresh myself," its that you're slighting our role for your desires and diminishing the buff cycle, lowering party performance as a direct result. You might think its going fine, but I can very much feel the difference.

RDMs are expected to maintain thier refresh and haste cycles, CORs and BRDs prefer to maintain a four-buff cycle, generally a cycle that benefits both ends of the party directly.

But its the diva mentality that RDMs get (and to a even extent, BRDs) that makes them forget they're not the only ones that keep the party moving. Trust me, I've had high-chain PTs that get along just fine without a RDM, just like I've had them without a BRD and most people have them without CORs. Dispite conventional belief, there are plenty of WHMs out there on the top of thier game and can keep up with a fast pace merit PT so long as one of those jobs supports them full-time, I never underestimate that +hMP gear unless its a roaming PT, which are actually very rare PTs.

Everyone gives up a little something to be in a merit PT, too. Trust me, I hate subbing /NIN and I can feel the loss of performance for the sake of just not getting hit. I can't begin to count the MNKs and DRGs whose skin crawls the second they put on the NIN sub. Its supposed to be the bread and butter sub or RNG, but I've honestly come to like /SAM and /WAR a lot better.

RDM has a lot of opportunities to melee, its more to the end that mainstream EXP PTs just aren't that place and that's also the fastest place to get the EXP, particularly in ToA camps. Worse is that RDMs never consider the changes made to the game that actually have made melee more practical and available in the last year. Trust me, the signet update, the +hHP buff and elimination of TP loss while resting was not a change made for melees, BLUs and BSTs' sake, but RDM's as well. Not to mention the addition of DNC and SCH make smaller PTs more practical, once again opening up the opportunity to melee for RDM.

Then there's Campaign, depending on if your skills are capped, this could be another option to play it how you want.

But mainstream EXP PTs have been and always will be about getting EXP as fast as possible, by the most comfortable means possible. Just the way it is and there's nothing you can do to change it, especially when you partake of it regularly. Complain about it all you want, but as long as you conform and want that fast EXP, you're going to have to do things the way you don't like doing them, that or find a PT/static willing to do things your way. Believe me, that's extremely rare.

So to get what you want, you gotta take that invite flag down, really. That's a hard thing to do for the 41+ RDM, possibly harder than anything else.

[Callisto]

Re: rdm as DD?

It's pretty much assumed for those of us discussing this(those actually seriously discussing it, with the gear, experience, and skills to pull it off) that the RDM is not main healing. This is for the most part assuming that there's a WHM in the party, and that the RDM is either pulling or would have nothing to do outside of Refreshing/Hasting otherwise, which is not entirely uncommon, to see a setup along the lines of WHM RDM BRD/COR DDx3 on Colibri(if you think this would be a bad setup you haven't had much merit experience).

In this kind of setup, really the RDM is dead weight if they don't melee, seeing as how there is little else they can do to contribute. They would have 3-4/tick Refresh without the BRD/COR, while the WHM would easily have 6-8, so there'd be no reason to not be up front and getting Minuet instead of Ballad, because they really have more than enough MP to do what their current role in the party is almost indefinitely, barring some fights that for whatever reason get a little out of hand.

And yes, I can be a bit of a diva in regards to XP, but that's the price for having a good support role player in your party, the same reason I would give a bit of extra leeway to an Adaberk/Ridill WAR, you put up with certain things if you want to crank out the merits quickly.

[Yellow Mage]

Re: rdm as DD?

When I saw the username Omgwtfbbqkitten, my skin crawled with the kind of the angry anti-frontline-RDM ranting I thought I'd be seeing. Much to my chagrin, it turned out to be a very logical, calm, collected, reasonable post.

Made a fool of me.

(Side note: you also just got my 1,000th Thanks!)

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: rdm as DD?

Some of you're gear, I'd think would improve if you change to the following for when DDing;
AF hands(+3dex, parrying when you get hate)
AF Feet(good for taking unexpected hits)

Sorry, but those aren't that useful at Greater Colibri camp. Critters just don't face me often enough to make defensive gear worthwhile--it's pretty much only when Souleater is up and I have the TP. Even then, I could just wait a bit for someone else to WS first or wait for tank to establish himself.

Heck, Battle Gloves would be better than AF hands. XD

(Caveat: That's on Joyeuse, which has low damage rating; higher rating swords' WS may do more.)

If you're soloing, that's an entirely different matter.

Warwolf Belt(Str + dex + vit > acc alone)
Snipers/Jeager's + Raja's or dex/str(Personally I'd take one acc and one stat ring to up the curve evenly)
...
AF hat(I find it more worth while meleeing with it to cast when needed than macroing it in/out)
...
Genbu's Shield(4acc of that tarque isn't that big of a deal imho and with /drk, -10% phys dmg taken is godly when you get hate @_@; )

I disagree; 72% accuracy was low. That's capped sword with 4 merits, Accurac+34 in gears, and sushi. There's no reason to remove accuracy gear at all until one start parsing near accuracy cap.

Amement Mantle+1 (No excuses, +1 or no DDing rdm)

It's a good item, but even with better gears than the ones you've listed, RDM won't be a real DD. =/

Sword Choices:
I haven't gotten a joytoy yet so no comment on how that works yet. So going with what I've toyed around with;
Martial Anelace(TP bonus, yummy, helps make up for lack of dmg/acc)
Royal Guards Flueret(+6acc, low delay, acceptable dmg)
Dissector(+6% crit rate, awesome sauce)

I don't see those as alternatives to Joyeuse or Justice Sword. On Colibri (my topic), Joyeuse is pretty much the only way to go.

Given that we sometimes have to switch to staves, and that we don't really want monsters to face us, it's counterproductive to worry too much about boosting weapon skills' damage. This is why high proc rate multi-hit weapons--Joyeuse and Justice Sword--fit front line RDM's purpose so well, IMO. They let us contribute to DoT significantly, with en-spell adding an additional small boost.

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: rdm as DD?

(those actually seriously discussing it, with the gear, experience, and skills to pull it off)

Successfully eliminating 100% of the posts from certain RDMs entering this discussion, who shall remain nameless.

This is for the most part assuming that there's a WHM in the party, and that the RDM is either pulling or would have nothing to do outside of Refreshing/Hasting otherwise, which is not entirely uncommon, to see a setup along the lines of WHM RDM BRD/COR DDx3 on Colibri(if you think this would be a bad setup you haven't had much merit experience).

Its assuming a lot. When you seek as RDM, BRD or COR and merit level, you're more than likely going to be paired with the others. If there isn't a RDM, BRD and COR will be invited to support WHM, or BRDx2. Basically, you're still assuming a scenario that happens in the rarest of circumstances unless you formed the PT yourself with that intention in mind.

When I saw the username Omgwtfbbqkitten, my skin crawled with the kind of the angry anti-frontline-RDM ranting I thought I'd be seeing. Much to my chagrin, it turned out to be a very logical, calm, collected, reasonable post.

Made a fool of me.

(Side note: you also just got my 1,000th Thanks!)

This has often been my stance on RDM melee, coming from the perspective other major PT supporters. Most RDMs have just stopped at "X Reason I don't want you to melee" and go off about how SE "intended" RDM to be such-and-such and sassafrass and how I'm a mean bastard for not wanting them to melee. Intention and execution are two different things and we've seen the intentions falter in favor of other potentials many times.

Ninja was intended to be a light DD/enfeebler and we made it a tank.
Blue Mage was intended to play DD/Support and most people just refuse to support.
Warrior was intended to DD and tank - most Warriors don't know what Provoke is.

Then you have the people who think Dancer was meant to tank since it got Animated Flourish and can tank in small PTs. They get torn to shreds on IT++, Paladins and Ninjas they are not. This is one of those situations where SE's intentions win out.

[Celeal]

Re: rdm as DD?

If there is a BRD in the Colbri party and the RDM is taking the Melee Songs... maybe the damage output from the RDM is decent.

Seriously, if MP is not a concern in the Colbri burn party, I would ask the RDM to melee.

Often, though, RDM is called upon to be the sole healer of the PT in a colibri PT and as a BRD or COR, ....

Not every Colibri party with RDM necessary be identical.


What I stated was:

If there is a BRD in the Colbri party and the RDM is taking the Melee Songs... maybe the damage output from the RDM is decent.

Seriously, if MP is not a concern in the Colbri burn party, I would ask the RDM to melee.


That does NOT mean that I would ask RDM to melee in every single Colibri party, for every single Colibri, all the time.

If the melee-RDM has issue with MP, fall back to the backline. *Be flexible* ... that is all I am asking.

I thought the statement was clear.....

[Omgwtfbbqkitten]

Re: rdm as DD?

And my point was it was an extreme "if" and "maybe" considering what BRD and RDM end up doing when they're invited together. I thought that was pretty obvious.

Again, the only way it becomes common is if you build the PT to have that possibility. Seek and it will never happen.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: rdm as DD?

And my point was it was an extreme "if" and "maybe" considering what BRD and RDM end up doing when they're invited together. I thought that was pretty obvious.

Again, the only way it becomes common is if you build the PT to have that possibility. Seek and it will never happen.

I guess you skipped over my overly long post about how I was invited by a WHM leader already at the Greater Colibri camp?

Not that I was looking to do any amount DD work, but it so happened that adding a little more damage was more useful than sitting in the back in that party.

It can happen. Sometimes, even to people who are (semi) prepared for it. (Thanks to Campaign Battles, I keep melee gears in the Mog House these days.)

[arkaine23]

Re: rdm as DD?

/DRK is not a great choice. RDMs should hit 10-15% of party damage easily at level 75 if prepared for meleeing. /WAR and /NIN will give the best damage period. Just put down your staves, seriously. A level 75 melee RDM is going to do fine at what is most needed from his mp without them:

Haste (no boost from staff)
Refresh (no boost from staff)
Dispel (doesn't need staff)
Dia (doesn't need staff)
Cures (loss of 10% curing potency is acceptable if you are a backup healer)
Self buffs (don't need staves)


Guess what? You have a whole lot more room for melee gear when you leave some of those staves in your MH.


Secondly...

/NIN for Colibri or other piericing weak targets. Evisceration is great damage. Mainhand a dagger and offhand Joyeuse. Wear haste and accuracy gear. Dual Weild bonus is awesome, moreso with haste gear and Suppanomimi. Even with sushi, you'll probably be pushing it to get 85% accuracy, but you should also be able to squeeze out 8-12% haste gear. The previous poster's mention of STR is quite valid. Low base damage weapons like daggers and joyeuse get a nice kick from chunks of STR. Hopefully you've got a BRD for Minuets, but even if there isn't one, speed, enspell, and piercing weakness go a long way to push mediocre damage into acceptable damage.

If you have to maintain haste/refreshes try to keep them at a minimum. Work it out with your WHM or whoever is backline healer. Find the right balance for their mp expenditure as far as how much hasting they can do for you. Don't drop Dia duty if your backline healer isn't doing it. Dia's very important for the party. Dispel also, if applicable.


Now 51-74 levels can be quite different. /BLU and /WAR offer some nice utility or damage abilities. Weapon selection has different considerations different pre-joyeuse and pre-evisceration.



A counter to general don't melee arguements.

Feed TP: This is pretty weak. Mobs use TP when they want (not often) for 75% of their health. The last 25% is where they spam. Plenty of other jobs hit weakly but are necessary on the fronline for other abilities such as THFs, DNCs, and PLDs. A party doesn't get pwned becasue these jobs are feeding the mob TP for low damage. It won't get pwned by TP moves just because of a RDM meleeing either. TP given matters vs HNM that can kill people with their TP. Generally we pick standard mobs for xp that do crap TP moves like steal food, buff themselves, single hit attack that can be blinked, etc. We avoid stuff that AOE dispels or paralyzes, or does tremedous damage.

AOE: Status AOE, ok you don't wanna eat those. If there are two backline mages that can status fix though, it really doesn't matter. Damage AOE? RDM has better defenses than the rest of the frontline and can heal themselves. The backline healer(s) should be using efficient curagas when the frontline eats AOE adamage anyway. Curaga doesn't cost more mp just becasue there's an extra person getting it. Single target cures should not ever be needed for a frontline RDM. Also, a RDM might want to eat some damage and use Fencer's Ring for short periods when his hp are down a little.

Dropping normal duties: I have to agree with this one. If you can't dispel, dia, and maintain haste/refresh and keep your mp pool going until convert, then don't melee. Or at least know when its time to pull back and do the usual casting/resting thing.


Staff swapping necessary: Sometimes yes. And in lower level ranges that doesn't matter so much because RDM weaponskills are pretty weak, so TP losss is not a big deal. Their main benefit prior to Vorpal Blade/Evisceration are for skillchaining, not so much for damage in and of themselves. However how often do NIN tanks cast their own Slow and Blind? Slow and Paralyze Gravity, Silence, Sleep, and Poison are the only enfeebles we'd commonly cast where staves are really critical. Slow actually sticks pretty well even without a staff. I used a wand for Slow all the way up to 72ish. That leaves Paralyze which has a short recast and costs only 6mp. Many RDMs skip Poison II entirely. Gravity gets skipped if mp or kill speed don't justify its expense. Sleep and Silence are special cases, not needeed too often. Also, nowadays even in the 50's and 60's Colibri are targets. So there are opportunities for meleeing even in the 55-74 range. Its usually with PLD tanks and vs IT++ or very high defense mobs where meleeing is tougher to justify and enfeebling gets better mileage.

As with anything, its situational. The situations are rare, but not non-existant. I don't turn down parties where the build isn't optimal. I figure everyone needs xp and I shouldn't be picky about it. Often the non-ideal parties can get a little boost from a melee RDM if the backline can support it and if the RDM knows what he's doing. Having 8+ subjobs doesn't mean I'm always going to suggest I can /NIN and DD. It means I'll size things up and suggest what I think may be the most beneficial option.

[BurningPanther]

Re: rdm as DD?

I'd like to add that life without the staves further becomes bearable after merits.

With full Enfeebling merits(and full Ice MAcc), I need the staves for only the most resistant mobs and NMs.

[ItazuraNhomango]

Re: rdm as DD?

Cures (loss of 10% curing potency is acceptable if you are a backup healer)

Not sure if I agree with this; I want the ability to take over main healing anytime it becomes necessary. Light Staff should always be in inventory, not in bazaar, and no more than a macro switch away.

Maybe Dark staff can be in the bazaar, but it comes out in a hurry when party's MP gets low. Kill speed is nice, chaining is great, but nothing ruins exp/hour faster than a death. Must always have MP enough to cure.

Actually, sleep is important enough at Colibri camp that I wouldn't go without Dark Staff ready; those birds take the oddest paths and link easily, and a missed Sleep can require a Sleep II and a Cure III or more to fix. Very much worth my TP to make sure it lands.

Hopefully you've got a BRD for Minuets, but even if there isn't one, speed, enspell, and piercing weakness go a long way to push mediocre damage into acceptable damage.

I don't think people want BRD, WHM, and RDM in the same party these days--certainly not for Greater Colibri. It's pretty much "pick two", and usually not "WHM + RDM", either.

With capped Enhancing magic (plus extra pieces thrown in on casting), I still see heavy (if inconsistent) resists with Enblizzard on Greater Colibri. En- spell was helpful, but not all that it can be. Something like: 19, 19, 2, 9, 2, 2, 19, ... was pretty common on neutral weather.

If you have to maintain haste/refreshes try to keep them at a minimum.

If I'm not maintaining those, why am I even in party?

AOE: Status AOE, ok you don't wanna eat those. If there are two backline mages that can status fix though, it really doesn't matter. Damage AOE? RDM has better defenses than the rest of the frontline and can heal themselves.

Depends on which status ailments, it may matter even with RDM, WHM, and BLM in party. BLM needs lots of MP heal time, use spells with very long cast time, so is generally unsuited for status fixes without decimating their damage output. It's less of loss of damage to have the RDM go as /WHM, stay in the back line, and help handle status fixes and backup cure than to make the BLM do it.

WHM, SMN, RDM together would be a bit different. But, at Lv.70+, probably would be better if the SMN use MP for BP:Rage instead of backup curing if there's a RDM to do that.

Between contributing a small amount of damage by melee'ing or staying in the back line to concentrate on keeping the party running smoothly, the choice is usually obvious--the right time to melee is fairly rare.

Dropping normal duties: I have to agree with this one. If you can't dispel, dia, and maintain haste/refresh and keep your mp pool going until convert, then don't melee. Or at least know when its time to pull back and do the usual casting/resting thing.

You left out curing. That is a part of our main duty. ^_^b

Staff swapping necessary: [ ...] However how often do NIN tanks cast their own Slow and Blind? Slow and Paralyze Gravity, Silence, Sleep, and Poison are the only enfeebles we'd commonly cast where staves are really critical. Slow actually sticks pretty well even without a staff.

I tried casting Slow w/out staves on Greater Colibris; none landed. Didn't macro in enfeebling gears, though, since it was one of those "I never thought I'd need a pulling macro on RDM" thing I did in 10 seconds. (Only 4 merits in Enfeebling Magic.)

Recast on Slow is bad enough that I don't really want to cast again if I can help it, if the tank needs it.

Its usually with PLD tanks and vs IT++ or very high defense mobs where meleeing is tougher to justify and enfeebling gets better mileage.

Don't forget nuking on MB. It happens rarely, but more often than a party I should melee in.

As with anything, its situational. The situations are rare, but not non-existant. I don't turn down parties where the build isn't optimal. I figure everyone needs xp and I shouldn't be picky about it. Often the non-ideal parties can get a little boost from a melee RDM if the backline can support it and if the RDM knows what he's doing.

1. (Underlined) I like the way you think. ^_^
2. (Bold) Now, that's the real truth of RDM DD'ing.

[arkaine23]

Re: rdm as DD?

IfritnoItazura: About minimizing cycles: I meant to communicate and balance things with the party healer and try to squeeze some extra swing time for yourself. And there could always be a 2nd RDM, in which case your need to maintain those spells is quite low, like self-only. About enspell: not many jobs can straight boost their damage/hit by so much 100% of the time. The resist rate sucks, but you should get an average around 11-13 I'd think even vs magic resistant Colibri. I did leave off curing from my minimal casting routine. Should only be needed in emergencies. Last time I was with a WHM at G Colibri, even she started meleeing now and then.

I was able to land sleeps whilst dual-wielding Blau Dolch and Joyeuse. I swapped everything else to my normal sleeping gear for the cast though, 320 enfeebling skill (full merits, earring, torque, af body, nashira legs). I'm sure it can be done with 300-315 skill fairly consistently too. Of course I could also just start soloing a link as /NIN, though my haste/refresh cycles might get delayed 10-20 seconds until the 1st mob was dead and someone pulled hate off me.

Slow is never really needed on Colibri, and most DDs will get antsy about enfeebles flying around randomly even if Haste immunizes them to Slow. G Colibri can't put out a whole lot of damage. Only a 1/3 chance of them even doing the damaging TP move. If there are two mages and melee are blinking properly, both mages will be at 75%+ mp the whole time.

Compare Cure IV for 390 vs 430, or Cure III 180 vs 210. Is that really a huge difference worth staff swap TP loss? For a backup healer? Especially if you could've turned out some Eviscerations with that TP...

Bringing the staves or not I haven't had much trouble. You can always keep your melee/staffless macros on the palette right next to your regular staff-switching macro palette. Switch modes easily that way if you need to.

The hardest thing for me is usually how fast mp goes if say I've got 4+ hastes to cycle and 2+ refreshes or maybe some DDs that don't share hate very well (or aren't /NIN) and wind up taking more damage than they should. Mp and convert timer merits make it work though. Its very rare for me to have to stop fighting, switch to full yigit, and pull back for ballads or to take a knee.

[Celeal]

Re: rdm as DD?

And my point was it was an extreme "if" and "maybe" considering what BRD and RDM end up doing when they're invited together. I thought that was pretty obvious.

Again, the only way it becomes common is if you build the PT to have that possibility. Seek and it will never happen.

It happens. I joined a level 62 pick-up party 2 weeks ago consist of RDM/WHM, BRD/WHM, NIN/WAR, WAR/NIN, MNK/THF (me), DNC/NIN and exp on Colibri. The backline RDM's MP just "sitting there and doing nothing" even after all the Cures and Hastes, only Convert when Reraise + Buffs wears off... Later when I find a RNG/NIN to replace me, that I expect one less DD to Haste.

And back to IfritnoItazura's case. If IfritnoItazura did not use the sword and hang back, is that a better approach? What else can be done?

[Callisto]

Re: rdm as DD?

Just a side note, there's no need to leave your staves in your MH just to include a melee set. >.>

I have all 8 staves, 2 swords, 1 shield, 1 ranged, 3 hats, 6 necks, 5 earrings, 6 bodies, 3 hands, 4 rings, 2 backs, 3 belts, 4 legs, and 4 boots, echo drops, food, ks/bs, imp. silver, and my lucky Bio II scroll on me at all times, and I still have a few spots open. Just because you might not use it all the time doesn't mean you can't carry it just in case, do your gobbybags.

[arkaine23]

Re: rdm as DD?

I like having 10+ slots free to collect stacks of stuff to sell, and as buffer room to easily drop crap now and then to make sure no KS or BS get lost. I still lug a Pluto and Aquilo staff most times.

Some cases do warrant a change of style. How many of us have been in 2 RDM parties, or RDM + other mage parties where mp seemed plentiful but kill speed seemed a bit too slow? DNCs now are taking loads of mp out of party healing coverage too, even though they're not really main healers. We take pride in how we can manage all the magely duties in merit and help churn out big xp. But we also complain about hating main-healing. When I see extra healing in a non-ideal party I don't groan and consider making excuses not to join. I smile and offer to check camps I know I can melee in to see if they're open, and mention to the leader that I've got maxed merits and HQ melee gear I wouldn't mind dusting off.

The point is to recognize when supplemental damage is worth it. And not just do a decent job, but to excel and maybe raise some eyebrows... breakthrough and exceed what other players are expecting from a RDM melee. Makes us all look good when done correctly and in the right situations. May not be worth it to most to do all the work getting the merits and HQ gear, but its not expensive to cover the basics. I think most RDM have at least some melee gear, especially these days where most players are multi-job 75's.

And we can always hope SE does something soon to help us out for frontlining like they've said they want to.