How hard is it to play a Blue

[Artaniss]

Hey guys, been reading the boards and was wondering how hard this class is? Is it expensive to level, and how hard is it to obtain spells. Also I just started playing and my highest character is 35 so am I still to new to play this job? And can the Blue solo well? From what I read the RDM at one time was the solo class and I was just wondering if the blue is good enough to do so? Please let me know.

Oh, and is the job quest hard to complete for a 34 DNC , 35 WHM or a 33 SCH? Thanks...

[Mirage]

Obtaining spells isn't hard, but it is tedious. Blue mage can solo really well. The quest is easy to complete as long as you have a way to sneak or invisible yourself. It is not too expensive, it depends on how much gear you want to get.

Some spells will be boosted by gear that is completely different from what you use to melee and WS in, so you might want to invest in more situational pieces, but this all depends on how important it is for you to compete near the top in endgame events. You'll get pretty far with affordable gear too.

As for how hard it is to play, it's not the simplest job to play, but other than figuring out what to wear and which spells to equip, it's not super complex either. You use some buffs and combine a few abilities and spells and then just smack your sword into things, basically.

For pure damage output, melee attacks are normally the way to go for blue mage. Spells are mostly to buff yourself, debuff the enemy, create passive traits, or heal yourself or your party. Blue magic cannot be cast on players outside of your party, unless there are some new spells that I am not aware of that are exceptions to this rule.

[Metaking]

Most top end blu gear is rare/ex, tho i think that's true for most job atm, but unlike most jobs, blu is very much a gear whore. Alot of spells have arbitrary rules they dont tell you about( in there descriptions), which some make an otherwise weak seeming move (regurgitation and its bind that can sometimes take a ton of dmg, and not break for instance) very useful. On difficulty well... unlike alot of jobs you gotta get use to learning what your fighting to figure out how best to fight it, most jobs if plan A(smash it with a hammer) dosnt work you use plan B(make it into sushi with a gs), on blu you got plans A to triple Z, and remembering when you pick a plan its not always the best to pick the one that maxes your dd..... so yea there is a learning curve most jobs don't have simply because you can change what it is your do in a fight.

[Aeonk]

I would say it's going to come down to playing the job yourself and getting a feel for it. But beyond that, it's also going to come down to knowing spells and traits like the back of your hand. There is no one universal spell set that's good for every situation, so expect to shuffle around magic a lot to adapt your role. BLU is easily one of the most versatile jobs in the game, but you have to know when to sacrifice versatility for min/max'ing stats to fill the role you're expected to do, and what spells to use/give up as a result of that.

[Artaniss]

Thank all for your replies. I now have another question. From level 1 on do I need to worry about gear or not until 50+ ? Also when looking for my spells each level is is the best strategy to get them as soon as I am able to? For example: I am level 4 and the mob that I can learn the spell from is far away is it best to take the trek and take time away from leveling and learn it or wait till I get higher and learn from experiencing from similar mobs while I am exp'ing with others. I hope this question makes sense lol. Thanks...

[Mirage]

Depends entirely on the spell. During your first 50 levels, there are going to be a lot of spells that you do not need, and a few that you do need. THen there are also spells that you do need but not until later. If you need two spells to create a certain job trait, where one of them is learnable at level 20 and the other is learnable at level 45, and the lv20 spell has no use except to create that trait combo, it is unproblematic to skip that lv20 spell until you are able to learn the lv45 spell.

Additionally, the ability to learn a spell is based on your blue magic skill rating, not your blue mage level. You can learn spells from enemies that are within 29 skill points of your skill level. For example: You are level 30 and have a capped blue magic skill at 93. You can learn spells that are up to the level where you would have a blue magic skill level of 93+29. This is 122, and 122 skill is obtainable at level 39, therefore you can learn blue magic up to (and including) the lv39 spells.

If you however were a level 30 blue mage with uncapped blue magic skill at only 64, you can only learn spells up to 64+29, which is skill level 93, which is equivalent to the maximum skill a level 30 blue mage naturally acquires. Therefore, with that level of skill you would only be able to learn blue magics that are listed as level 30 or below.

Equipment pieces that boost blue magic skill counts, so wearing such pieces will allow you to learn higher level spells that you would not normally be able to learn. Once you reach the minimum skill level required, there is so far no evidence of additional skill having any impact on how easily you learn the spell. The only known piece of gear that increases the chance of learning a spell that you are in range of is the artifact armor gloves, and the upgraded (+1) version of these.

For example, I learned Bloodrake (a level 99 spell) with only a base blue magic skill of around 360, while the requirements to learn it is skill level 395 or higher, because I wore enough skill gear to boost it from my natural ~360ish to exactly 395. Learned it within two uses after I put on those pieces of gear.

[Artaniss]

Ok I am having a helluva time getting sandstorm from worms in starter zone. they are casting everything other then SS. Am I doing something wrong? Been huntung worms for like an hour lol and nothing...

[Artaniss]

Heh Finally one casted SS and with my luck i didn't learn it... Arghhhhh lol

[Mirage]

Sandspin, you mean? Don't bother. Besides, enemies can only use TP moves (all blue magic are considered TP moves when used by monsters) if they gain TP. If they are not physically hitting you, and you are not physically or magically hitting them, they are not gaining TP and will therefore not use TP moves.

Keeping out of range of a worm and wait for it to use sandspin won't help, for example. Sandspin isn't exactly an important spell to know so you can just skip it. You will definitely learn it later whenever you join an exp party in abyssea latheine.

[Aeonk]

Ok I am having a helluva time getting sandstorm from worms in starter zone. they are casting everything other then SS. Am I doing something wrong? Been huntung worms for like an hour lol and nothing...

I think now more than ever is the appropriate time to say....

Welcome to Blue Mage.

[Zagen]

Sandspin, you mean? Don't bother. Besides, enemies can only use TP moves (all blue magic are considered TP moves when used by monsters) if they gain TP. If they are not physically hitting you, and you are not physically or magically hitting them, they are not gaining TP and will therefore not use TP moves.

Keeping out of range of a worm and wait for it to use sandspin won't help, for example. Sandspin isn't exactly an important spell to know so you can just skip it. You will definitely learn it later whenever you join an exp party in abyssea latheine.
Not important at all, not like it's 100% land rate under normal conditions making it good skill up spell option.


Heh Finally one casted SS and with my luck i didn't learn it... Arghhhhh lol

You'll have good days and bad days but in the end it's totally worth it.

[Mirage]

Not important at all, not like it's 100% land rate under normal conditions making it good skill up spell option.
You're correct in that it is 100%, but if you're skilling up, your physical spells will probably be damned near capped hitrate, making sandspin only 5% more accurate. I mean it never hurts having it, but I wouldn't spend time trying to get that particular spell, cause the time saved from it while skilling up could easily be eaten up by the time it takes to learn it.

So yeah, not really important :p.

[Artaniss]

OK is it me or is learning the spells like a 10% chance of success lol. I have been killing and killing and I have 3 low level spells. I am now level 11 and only 3 spells I learned. Is there a way to do it? A certain way to learn the spell? Do you guys let lower level mobs keep hitting you after they use a TP skill and it isnt the one you need so they can build up tp again? Please let me know how you guys do it... Thanks lol...

[Mirage]

Basically, you just feed the mob as much TP as you can (lots of weak attacks that do as close to 1 damage as possible, but not 0), hope it uses the attack, and if it doesn't, feed it more TP. There's no way of telling if you learned it until after you kill the mob, sadly. There really isn't a trick to it. Just be in skill range, hope the mob uses it, hope you learn it.

Artifact gloves increase the chances, additionally, there might be different learning rates for different spells, but this is pure speculation on my part. I haven't seen data supporting this anywhere, just saying it might be a possibility. That's why I suggest you don't get too hung up in learning some spells that aren't extremely important, and just level the job and instead back-track to get these spells when you are strong enough to withstand the enemies easily, and able to feed it a lot of TP without killing it. For the first few dozen levels, I'd say some of the spells you shouldn't miss are wild carrot, cocoon, and head butt. If you randomly learn more spells than that, that's great, but I wouldn't set aside a ton of time to get them early in my levels.

[Alpheus]

Another tip to use once you can sub /rdm is to spam the dia spell provided it inflicts at least 1 point of damage upon landing. That 1 point of Damage grants the mob you're fighting 10TP (this amount is affected by Subtle Blow) this made /rdm my go to sub once i went about collecting my spells. Howeveer this assumes you have refresh from /rdm or battery charge so for the most part having a onion sword or a lvl 1 club would more than suffice as your TP weapon.

I prefer using swords because I have a superstition that it increases my chances that much more but that's more personal preference since it helps me actually want to go out and learn spells. Other people have other superstitions and whatnot but the thing you should take away from this is that use the things that are for certain gonna help you learn the spell and then whatever else beyond that should simply be superstitions/routines that make the process of spell farming all the more bearable.

[Zagen]

You're correct in that it is 100%, but if you're skilling up, your physical spells will probably be damned near capped hitrate, making sandspin only 5% more accurate. I mean it never hurts having it, but I wouldn't spend time trying to get that particular spell, cause the time saved from it while skilling up could easily be eaten up by the time it takes to learn it.

So yeah, not really important :p.

You should have checked the OP's character, also you should never assume everyone has capped sword before touching BLU.
______________________________________________________


Another spell you should work on getting is Bludgeon it's great damage at lower levels and because of it's relatively low damage cap (300-400 or so) it's often a good spell at higher levels for feeding TP (30 TP if all hits land).

Alpheus' tip on /RDM is good, if you find your Dia/2s doing 0 damage you can switch to Stone which can't do 0 damage under normal circumstances.

[Mirage]

Don't need capped sword to have a good hit rate against EP monsters, and most of the time, you won't set aside time specifically for skillups and go after DC-EM, except when you reach levels 75+ or something. At least I wouldn't bother to. And sword skills up relatively fast anyway.

[Artaniss]

Well, I am level 14 now and my Blue magic is capped and so are my swords :) I got pollen last night which I would assume help me considerably in keeping my blue magic capped. Now I am having a hellva time getting the metallic buff from the crabs. :) Thanks for all your replies...

[Mirage]

Self/party target magic has an abysmal chance of giving you skillups. Low-cost, fast cast enemy targeted magic is what you should rely on if you want skillups.

[Babekeke]

In the low levels, you want to be sure to learn:

Pollen (Cure)
cocoon (best defensive buff)
metallic body (good defensive buff at low level)
sprout smack (slow enfeeble)
head butt (stun)
bludgeon (cheap and strong damaging spell)
Sheep song (AOE sleep for links)
healing breeze (good cure in parties, but also gives auto-regen when paired with sheep song)

With just those spells, you will get by just fine until you are high enough to learn Wild carrot (not soloable when you can first learn it).

I'd suggest happily levelling with these spells until you are level 50, then start the artifact quests. At this point you'll also want to have progress on Chains of Promathia missions to get access to Riverne so you can learn Refuelling (haste).

Once you have AF hands and you are level 56, it's then a good time to go back and collect any spells that you missed and would really like. You'll also want AF body for +15 magic skill, and the feet are good for soloing with their 10 evasion skill.

Also, you may want to unlock and level ninja as a support job at some point, though DNC will probably be fine for you for a lot of stuff.

[Mirage]

Can't believe i forgot sheep song. Yeah, that thing is pretty important.

[Trumpy]

i have been told ( i dont know what it really gives) that bludgeon gives bout 18ish TP to the mob. so i usually use it especially if it doesnt do much dmg. if it kills mobs too fast i resort to soemthing else. i usually use a 1 dmg club or fist or soemthign weak for tp feeding.

as for rates of learning it really is jsut random luck. it took me like 15 shade mobs to learn dimensional death. its their only tp move. bombs have 2 moves. i let one hit me while i was turned for an hour before it stopped usin berserk and used self destruct. it used berserk soooooooooooo many times. Some spells are just stubborn. but your biggest problem will be can you survive fightin them or if they have 15 different tp moves and you never see the one you need.

when i was a young blue i tried to have them use the move as many times as possible before i killed them but all they really need to do is use it once. some spells u just have trouble learning and others are 1/1. usually if my skill is capped i learn within 5 times of seeing it. alot of times once. but when i was leveling before 75 cap was removed i always learned all my spells before i could use them (all of them even if they werent useful) until i got to the 50s and there were spells you could not solo. like dragons were hard to learn body slam at the time for me. but im more of a completionist.

I am prolly a bad blu but i dont mess with the enfeebles as much or buffs except the main ones like refresh haste cocoon (sometimes cocoon feels short and i just forget about it cause i get tired of casting it so often) ect... but alot of good blus use them.

[Dhragon]

Since I always had the assistance of my wife (either tanking or healing), when I was bringing the job up, I would stop every 10 levels and learn all the spells that I could ahead of my current level. The amount of time spent capping my skills and learning my spells didn't bother me. It was all about having all the spells for me. I knew if I had all the spells I could know before I got to that level, I'd be able to keep evolving my spell setup as I reached those higher levels.

But each player is different on how/why they leveled their Blu in the manner that they did. Just don't let the times when you spend hours trying to learn one spell wear on you. Thankfully, for me, it didn't happen that often and I actually enjoyed spell farming (since I usually didn't have any other reason to fight certain mobs).

I'm currently only missing one spell, Tourbillion. Just not having any luck getting a Khimmy spawn in Nyzul. :)

[Trumpy]

yea i think i only lack the unbridled knowledge moves (only some of them)

[Aeonk]

I'm currently only missing one spell, Tourbillion. Just not having any luck getting a Khimmy spawn in Nyzul. :)

Best bet would be to do your assault rank ups to get to First Lieutenant. I'll take 4 100% attempts at khimaira over 4 33% attempts any day.

[XoN]

Hey guys, been reading the boards and was wondering how hard this class is? Is it expensive to level, and how hard is it to obtain spells. Also I just started playing and my highest character is 35 so am I still to new to play this job? And can the Blue solo well? From what I read the RDM at one time was the solo class and I was just wondering if the blue is good enough to do so? Please let me know.

Oh, and is the job quest hard to complete for a 34 DNC , 35 WHM or a 33 SCH? Thanks...

Personally, I played all the jobs that weren't melee only-styled jobs. I wasn't ready for it. Blue is more about understanding the roles in the game. Everyone's role. Blue's can solo well, but perhaps, they were built to play in gangs. I think almost all jobs can solo these days.