Blue Mage Adjustment Suggestion

[doctorugh]

SE appears to be in a tweaking mode, so I thought I'd drop in my 2 cents (and wanted to consolidate the ideas of some others as a last push for correction before the update)

#1) Fix Tourbillion and Barbed Crescent: The additional effects don't proc, no sense in having these spells otherwise.

#2)Unbridled Learning: There are lots of interesting spells to use here, but once per 5 minutes is too long to wait. I would propose getting 1 charge per 3 minutes and holding a maximum of three charges. If SE is concerned that spamming the same spell 3 times is too strong, give it a 3 minute recast timer. Starting a fight with Tourbillion (which in theory would would actually give def down, see #1); and having the ability to quickly get back hp (bloodrake) or maybe have some additional def (harden shell) during the fight would be welcome. Perhaps even chaining during AL. None of our UL spells are that powerful that doing more than one in five minutes would "un-balance" the game; and the charges would give it some limit.

#3)Spells sets: Give us a way to swap between predetermined spell sets that we create and can access through a macro. Not only does this help with our procing issues; but I waste tons of time in the MH swapping to blue and thinking about which spells I need for which setup. I would even take a nerf of a longer wait time before casting if this were made.

#4)Physical Blue magic stance: Our ability to raise "blue magic attack" is limited to blue skill (of which we only have a few pieces), and STR (which only gives tiny increments). I would propose a stance that has a positive of boosting blue attack (25% seems reasonable like berserk) with a draw back (balance) of +slow or melee attack down.
Perhaps 5 min recast with a total active time of 3 minutes, similar to berserk. Our ability to damage very high level mobs with physical spells tends to be a weak point of ours. Options are always a welcome addition. The other way to do with would be through use a of a food that buffs blue attack (cant use melee food = balance)

#5) Pyric Bulwark = In theory if you could predict a powerful WS by a mob, you could insta-cast and block (once per 5 min); however currently you need to /ja "UL" prior to casting....at which time the WS is already through. I would suggest either make it 3 hits blocked; or making it a set-able spell.


Blue mage is a very versatile/fun job that overall, I believe, SE has done a very good job with. These few minor tweaks would reduce frustration with some aspects of the job.

[Dragonlord]

These would be great changes to the job in my opinion. I'd like to add a little to it as well:

#5) pyric bulwark - instead of making it a super long recast utsusemi (essentially), make it more like smn's earthen armor or nin's migawari. We don't care about dodging 1 random attack, as we can do so through occultation or evasion. A spell that's on a timer linked to a JA should actually be useful. Make this so the attack has to either 1) reduce our hp to 0, or 2) deal over a certain % of our hp, in order to null the more dangerous attacks.

#4) physical blue magic stance - to add to this, make more stances. Make a magical stance that reduces DD efficiency (through slow or other means) and a stance for meleeing that reduces or restricts the use of spells. (similar to saber dance. This move could give DA, TA, or JA haste)

[Daniel_Hatcher]

These would be great changes to the job in my opinion. I'd like to add a little to it as well:

#4) physical blue magic stance - to add to this, make more stances. Make a magical stance that reduces DD efficiency (through slow or other means) and a stance for meleeing that reduces or restricts the use of spells. (similar to saber dance. This move could give DA, TA, or JA haste)

Stance type of abilities need to stay on SCH, they do not fit with BLU.

[Dragonlord]

Stance type of abilities need to stay on SCH, they do not fit with BLU.

You mean sch, sam, war, mnk, dnc etc...

Many jobs have stances and SE has stated they look into giving more jobs stance-like abilities. You've given no reason why it wouldn't fit with blu. Blu is a jack of all trades, it adjusts to different situations that arise. Stances allow jobs to further specialize in one area while diminishing effectiveness in another. I'd say blu is the perfect job to be given stances based on that fact.

[Daniel_Hatcher]

You mean sch, sam, war, mnk, dnc etc...

Many jobs have stances and SE has stated they look into giving more jobs stance-like abilities. You've given no reason why it wouldn't fit with blu. Blu is a jack of all trades, it adjusts to different situations that arise. Stances allow jobs to further specialize in one area while diminishing effectiveness in another. I'd say blu is the perfect job to be given stances based on that fact.

It's already limited to the spells it sets, you're now asking to limit it further. You want a stance the spells set are already that.

It's only truly a loose Jack of all Trades as it can in a sense master itself with the spells it's set, a jack of all trades master nothing.

[doctorugh]

With the physical stance idea, I just wanted a way to do more damage with physical spells on high level mobs (level correction kills us) since our ability to adjust blue attack is extremely limited. I kinda just threw in the "gimps melee attack" for a sense of "balance", so that other jobs wont complain that we are overpowered. Another alternative to this would be to allow for the level correction to work like ranged attacks (-0.025 instead of -0.05 per level difference).

[Nightfyre]

I'd rather just see physical spells scale better with level correction, and I'm going to have to chime in against the proposed stance. I think the idea of a stance could be interesting, but realistically I think it would hurt us in the long run since they'd balance all future BLU content with its existence in mind and it's not going to be something I'll want to keep up in many situations if something akin to the proposed penalty was implemented.

1/2/3/5 though, absolutely. Less important, but I'd also like to see Vapor Spray fixed on principle.

Yes, I am aware there is a thread about the macc of the aforementioned spells being broken. However, in the past something like this would (usually) be fixed relatively quickly as part of a maintenance following an update. This has not happened, and I have to admit I'm concerned that it may have been skimmed over or outright ignored when fixes like this should be a priority shortly after an update.

[doctorugh]

Oh wait forgot one other thing that has bothered me since the beginning....Monster Correlation merits. My guess is that it was supposed to be 4% per merit instead of 0.4% per merit. Is 20% more damage on correct correlation to much to ask (and it rarely comes up) for a fully merited ability?

[Kieron]

They should reduce the wait time on switching spells to at least 30 seconds. Blu has the second highest amount of magic procs in VW yet we get to wait one minute while every other mage goes down his/her line.

The per-determined spells set, while a nice and welcome addition, I don't think the trade off for a longer wait time would be the best thing. Sort your proc spells manually and you should be fine for the most part.

I agree on Unbridled Learning needing a charge system and lower recast.

Stances could be nice but blu is already a powerful DD with an Almace and the correct gear and traits. I doubt you'd want the community crying about how "broken" blu is thus leading to the inevitable nerf.

[SpankWustler]

1/2/3/5 would all be fantastic.

I'd rather have more favorable level correction for Blue Magic Attack rather than 4. Since our spells already tear through weaker stuff, I worry any other option for increasing Blue Magic Attack would be "balanced" against in various ways.