Red mage - Definition and Overview

In the Final Fantasy series of video games from Square Enix, the Red Mage (or Red Wizard) is a character class similar to the Bard in the Dungeons & Dragons role-playing game. Red Mages use the abilities of both Black Mages and White Mages and have the combat abilities of a Warrior, but are dilettantes and are not as good at any one ability as are any of the other classes. In general, they are only able to cast lower-level spells, and even then, not necessarily every one of those.

Red Mages first appeared in the game Final Fantasy I for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). At this time, they were extremely overpowered compared to the other characters because of their ability to heal themselves and deliver decent melee damage. They next appeared in Final Fantasy III where they were fundamentally unchanged, weakened only slightly by the fact that their ability to wield heavy swords and armor was much more limited than before. "Final Fantasy V", brought about the creation of their trademark "Doublecast" skill, which would appear frequently in subsequent Final Fantasy games, even when the Red Mage itself was absent.

Increasingly, however, the Final Fantasy series began to deemphasize the distinction between white magic and black magic, and it was no longer unusual for characters to be able to utilize both types of magic equally well, essentially eliminating the need for the Red Mage. The Red Mage class did not reappear until Final Fantasy Tactics Advance, where, once again, it proved to be mildly unbalanced due to its ability to cast a spell twice in a row (this ability was usually paired with a Summoner subclass to allow doublecasting of two powerful spells).

The Red Mage appeared once more in the MMORPG Final Fantasy XI. Because of the invention of the "hate system", a Red Mage doublecasting spells would be extremely useless. To compensate for this, Square Enix gave the Red Mage class a proficiency with Enfeebling and Enhancing magic.

Red Mage is also a character in the online web comic 8-Bit Theater (http://www.nuklearpower.com/). In gamer jargon, he would be classified as a "min/maxer" and "metagamer," using out-of-character knowledge to gain in-character advantages.

'Red Mages' of a sort also appear in Dungeons and Dragons. The Red Wizards of Thay are a powerful, hierachical organization of magic-users in the Forgotten Realms campaign setting. 'Red,' in this case, refers to the color of the Thayans' ubiquitous cloaks, rather than adherence to a particular technique or school of magic. In fact, arcane magic-users of every school are found in the organization, and the Red Wizards' leadership is spearheaded by the single most powerful mages of each school of magic (Necromancy, Divination, etc.), who are referred to as Zulkir.

In terms of the Dungeons and Dragons alignment system, the Thayans as a whole are strongly law- and evil-aligned. Two examples of this are Thay's extensive use of slave labor and the internecine conflicts which may be the single largest obstacle to the Red Wizards' goals- ambitious Red Wizards may seek to become Zulkir at whatever cost to their rivals, their fellow Red Wizards, and even Zulkir are often preoccupied with plots to undermine the schemes of their fellow Zulkir.