Don't like Blue Mage? Here is how to convince SE to change it...

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Originally Posted by Fyce

I don't think you fully graps how hard and time consuming it is to "design one set of skill for group content". They can't even keep a good balance between three tanks that has been around for more than three years now. Same for the three healers. And if the leaks are correct, we're getting one more for each of these roles.
And now you ask them so simply make another set? And your argument is that WoW did some stuff and that "they are a multibillion dollar company". That's... not how that works. At all.

P.S.: WoW's balance is trash compared to FFXIV's. Lots of builds are absolute tosh, and every expac you get everything thrown upside-down. I really wouldn't take it as a good example.

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Great! Using your logic Square should full stop put an end to all this "limited class" nonsense and ANY new classes and focus on what they have because they cannot even manage what is presently in the game. Who knows? Perhaps you're right. I think many would disagree, but it's an interesting notion.

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Originally Posted by Elerus

Great! Using your logic Square should full stop put an end to all this "limited class" nonsense and ANY new classes and focus on what they have because they cannot even manage what is presently in the game. Who knows? Perhaps you're right. I think many would disagree, but it's an interesting notion.

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What about "my logic" has to do with anything of what you talked about? My logic is that the amount of ressources is finite, and that you are asking something that goes beyond the line. Stretching that into saying that they shouldn't do anything else is ridiculous.
Fallacious arguments and strawman won't get you anywhere with me bud'. (Edit: Well, actually that's wrong. It usually gets people in my blacklist.)

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Originally Posted by Fyce

What about "my logic" has to do with anything of what you talked about? My logic is that the amount of ressources is finite, and that you are asking something that goes beyond the line. Stretching that into saying that they shouldn't do anything else is ridiculous.
Fallacious arguments and strawman won't get you anywhere with me bud'.

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Likewise moving the goalpost won't with me. But I'll assume you wish to converse in good faith. So, allow me to help you. I will now quote verbatim what you wrote earlier:

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Originally Posted by Fyce

They can't even keep a good balance between three tanks that has been around for more than three years now. Same for the three healers. And if the leaks are correct, we're getting one more for each of these roles.

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Square, by your own admission, cannot entertain "my" idea because it takes too many resources. In fact you then point out they cannot even adequately handle or balance the jobs present in the game at this moment. Therefore, since Square are already in your own words overburdened it makes no sense for them to add any additional new jobs - Blue Mage or otherwise.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

1.
I wasn't expecting it to be implemented until we'd first had previewed sweeping changes to job design favoring cohesion, identity, and versatility over templates. With those changes in place, the minimal further effort would be required to integrate BLU, while BLU in turn could promote further beneficial changes.

2.
None, ultimately, save for its "moments of glory" in combat, which would not be unique for having them -- only in the shape they take. All else, I'd actually hope would gradually become the property of all jobs for whom it'd at all make sense.
Learning skills from who you fight and how you fight them? Sold. I'll buy that for everyone, albeit to a lesser degree.
Combos not as chains but as inherent synergies between different effects, bonuses, or aspects within different skills? Sold. I'll buy it for everyone.
BLU could be the first to prototype the change, letting the devs test the waters and give a poster boy to the potential change, but it should be in the interest of universal design where possible.

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As much as I would like to see something similar, it is simply not realistic at the moment, to say nothing of the risk. Which is why I think it's smart that they have implemented Blue Mage the way they have; if their intention is to open up and expand the combat system then Blue Mage is the perfect 'test bed' for it (i.e. there is no type of ability that is out of place for a Blue Mage). And by making it 'limited' they can test and gather feedback with minimal risk of disrupting the established game (such as accidentally making a current tier raid bosses killable with Death).

This is pure speculation of course, which is why I framed my questions the way I did; this is the here and now, we must deal with reality, so given the realistic choices, which is the lesser of the evils.

Would like to say for every one of you crying about a job that has not even been released yet there are a hundred of us eager and willing to give SE the chance to show us something new. Limited job or no it's a good thing I personally am tired of following the same tried and true fully mapped leveling route for every single job. Which I can't help doing it's a mental program it's like autopilot. Am I sad it appears bluemage spell learning parties can't happen? Yes! Would I benefit as a blu from grinding spells from dungeon mobs? No i'm a filthy casual I do other things with my time. Let SE drop the other foot, lets give the system a fair shake, and if it works yay if no then complain with riteous indignation but don't complain before it's even live.

Waiting until after BLU is released to complain about its inability to partake in matchmade group content is akin to people returning after the MSQ roulette changes to find the cutscenes unskippable. Not only is SE even less likely to change things up then, but why should we wait to voice concerns about things we already know we don't like?
NO ONE IS SAYING TO GET RID OF MASKED CARNIVAL. They just want BLU in regular content too, yeesh.

But don't worry, I'm sure they'll put very lovely carrots behind the Masked Carnival to pad those participation numbers, luring in all the people who otherwise would not have bothered with the class because they can't use it outside of that content. And then, because you have so many people not really interested but with motivation to partake, you're going to get people with zero tolerance to other people, you're going to get bots, you're going to get griefing, just like you did in virtually any other game mode SE has introduced before, be it PvP, Eureka, or what have you.

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Originally Posted by TThibi

Let SE drop the other foot, lets give the system a fair shake, and if it works yay if no then complain with riteous indignation but don't complain before it's even live.

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I've said it before, I'll say it again:

No, let's NOT wait until January to try out BLU, discover it can't play with people (like they explicitly said), and then be told to wait until Shadowbringers launches, then be told to wait until 5.1, 5.2, 5.3... don't worry guys, SE will TOTALLY fix it! People like you are why 1.0 was such hot garbage and you should be ashamed of saying something like this.

Nobody here has a problem with BLU learning skills from enemies. I have literally never seen that complaint. Nobody would be broken up if BLU had a unique progression system where the majority of their skills were gained from enemies and not simply from leveling. Hell I was excited for that part! Nobody's complaining about the Carnival either, outside of it being a potential waste of resources. Nobody says BLU shouldn't have anything unique or interesting about them. Every single complaint about BLU (aside from one guy being disappointed about the cane) is about it being excluded from endgame content for incredibly flimsy reasons. THIS IS NOT SOMETHING WE NEED TO PLAY TO KNOW IT IS BAD.

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Originally Posted by TThibi

Let SE drop the other foot, lets give the system a fair shake, and if it works yay if no then complain with riteous indignation but don't complain before it's even live.

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You say this like it's reasonable, yet specifically choose an idiom synonymous with an unchangeable inevitability? That's not asking for a fair shake. That's accepting the axe.

By the time it's live, it's not going to change unless the (early) live presence is specifically a testing ground.

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Originally Posted by Acidblood

As much as I would like to see something similar, it is simply not realistic at the moment, to say nothing of the risk. Which is why I think it's smart that they have implemented Blue Mage the way they have; if their intention is to open up and expand the combat system then Blue Mage is the perfect 'test bed' for it (i.e. there is no type of ability that is out of place for a Blue Mage). And by making it 'limited' they can test and gather feedback with minimal risk of disrupting the established game (such as accidentally making a current tier raid bosses killable with Death).

This is pure speculation of course, which is why I framed my questions the way I did; this is the here and now, we must deal with reality, so given the realistic choices, which is the lesser of the evils.

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All improvement, all change, starts with here and now. No one is expecting sweeping changes today or even next patch and quite likely not the patch after that. What we're expecting is for the devs to show that they're aware of where barebone or ill-thought developments have felt lackluster, know how to gradually implement improvements to those and other areas of content, are willing to accept that the treadmill pattern is getting stale, have plans to renovate from it so that patches feel fresh, and will finally develop side-content is such a way that its assets and tech created for that purpose also aids the far greater bank of content outside the game.

It is of course the perfect "test bed", as you've said. The problem is that everything we've received in and with its announcement points at it not being prototypical, but rather -- placating. Rather than showing foresight, it looks like smug self-assurance, "Those things you say you want or find dull, you don't; we know better. And since you guys love side-content so much even when the resources spent offer nothing to the vast majority of the game, here's more side-content."

The possibilities are damn near endless. They've just been explicitly and implicitly cut down until we've been left with just a single toe of what it could have been.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Nor are our options here solely "get a butchered BLU" or "don't get BLU at all".

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I suppose they started their BLU concept expecting it to fit XIV's mold at first. If they ended with that version of BLU, I'd assume that it's because they didn't find a way to make a traditionnal job work while retaining the core concept of BLU.

Sure, they could have made BLU learn their spells via monsters in quest, like other jobs did, but I'm not sure people would have really liked that. At best, they could have made you chose the order of the spells (14 spells for 14 quests and you pick one of them at each quest). Their is also the issue BLU is frequently massively overpowered in every game it appeared on.

They also commented on how not having the appropriate spells might result in being kicked, but, for me, it felt like overdramatizing. After all, you're not forced to do your job quest right now, so you could end up with a tank not having all its skills (True story when I ran Coil, our WAR forgot to unlock Infuriate :p).

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

The stronger the mob, the less they're affected by a Slow, such that the damage reduced from a trash mob and a boss are very similar despite their varying power levels.

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You'll probably end with FF frequent issue with debuffs. The only mobs that would be affected significantly by them are those that you can kill without those effect easily. Especially if BLU is the only job to have expanded CC.

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Originally Posted by Canadane

But I do like it.
The game needs more solo content. I'm very welcoming of the idea of limited jobs.

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Hate to be that person, but isn't this a multiplayer game?

It is an MMO. It's also irrelevant to the fact that sometimes people want to do things by themselves. Not everything needs to be group content in an MMO.

While I was a bit disappointed that BLU isn't a normal class, I still think that it's better than nothing.

I was expecting 2 new classes to be added in Shadowbringers, but instead we essentially get two and a half, which more than what I expected.

I was always worried about FFXIV team using the exact same formula for every patch and every expansion, but I'm sort of glad that they are at least trying to implement something new, and who's to say BLU will forever remain a limited class? Wouldn't be the first time the developers have changed their mind over something. The way I see it, this Blue Mage could serve as a "beta-test" of sorts, if it's in the game, that's already a step to the right direction.

We need more limited jobs.

I wish Summoner was a limited job as well. A true Summoner, and not this disgusting "warlock with a pet" job that we got now.

Hope BLU works, so we will get a true Beastmaster that can charm monsters to fight for him, instead of a generic BST job that has a melee rotation + pet (boring).


All my support for BLU, will enjoy it!

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Originally Posted by ChocoFeru

I wish Summoner was a limited job as well. A true Summoner, and not this disgusting "warlock with a pet" job that we got now.

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Fun fact, in most FF games, Summoner is only a flashier and more mp-expensive Black Mage (Not sure people would like a "faithfull" FF summoner)
But, in most games where Summoner actually has a real "pet", the party literrally go away to let if fight solo. So in a sense, maybe it should have been a Limited Job.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

I suppose they started their BLU concept expecting it to fit XIV's mold at first. If they ended with that version of BLU, I'd assume that it's because they didn't find a way to make a traditional job work while retaining the core concept of BLU.

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I see no reason to assume that they started with aims to create a combat-ready BLU, and -- as naive or egotistic as it may sound -- suspect shortsightedness if they honestly could not find a way to make a "true" BLU work as a content-ready job.

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Sure, they could have made BLU learn their spells via monsters in quest, like other jobs did, but I'm not sure people would have really liked that.

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This has nothing to do with BLU being made content-ready. All other jobs could as easily have their skills learned through RNG methods in the open world and specifically designed content and it would not remotely affect their ability to be matched into content. At worst, without merely sane guideposts or requirements, they would underperform when missing certain skills relative to having them, but competency variation already exists in far greater amounts based on simple player ability alone, even in a guaranteed skillset. (Hell, perhaps with a bit more agency in the acquisition process, and more difficult solo content included in the process, people might bother to read their tooltips and understand what rotations work and why, indirectly decreasing the variation in player performance in leveling dungeons.)

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At best, they could have made you chose the order of the spells (14 spells for 14 quests and you pick one of them at each quest). Their is also the issue BLU is frequently massively overpowered in every game it appeared on.

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But, it hasn't been. Certain skills have been incredibly powerful in the right contexts, but BLU itself has not been overpowered in "every game it appeared on".

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They also commented on how not having the appropriate spells might result in being kicked, but, for me, it felt like overdramatizing. After all, you're not forced to do your job quest right now, so you could end up with a tank not having all its skills (True story when I ran Coil, our WAR forgot to unlock Infuriate :p).

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For now it can at at best be a "hero class". Allow it to progress through the latest expansion only after another job has already reached level cap, and attach simply attach a warning to it that job acquisition is an additional responsibility. Signal in the Recommended Duties and/or Actions & Traits pane when one may unlock a further action. Done. They were warned.

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You'll probably end with FF frequent issue with debuffs. The only mobs that would be affected significantly by them are those that you can kill without those effect easily. Especially if BLU is the only job to have expanded CC.

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Not unless you do a poor job of it. The steps to create a balanced defensive debuff are both simple and universally beneficial.

1. Allow for dynamic cooling rates, rather than solely reduced recast times. You can think of this as the difference between the old Spear card, which worked only before abilities went off and affected each varying recast time by a percentage -- varying in flat amount -- and what would affect the recast times if cast after usage and would, after its effect time, reduce each recast time by the same flat amount, maintaining sync.
2. Give debuffs actual potencies. This is multiplied by the caster's relevant stats and effects just as damage would be. It is cast on an enemy and...
3. Calculate percentile through the formula 20 times debuff "damage" divided by in-nominal-duration generative mob damage. This refers to how much damage the mob is recharging every second within the debuff's stated duration.

Modifications specific to Slow and Blind. (Slow and Blind do not include avoidable damage in its in-duration generative damage calculation.

• Calculate the damage that would be dealt for the original strike. Do not inflict.
• Calculate the damage that was dealt for the real, delayed/blinded strike. Inflict.
• Reduce duration of the remaining Slow/Blind debuff as if adding the difference between the second and first to the in-duration damage. (In this way the effect is accounted for only if it makes an actual difference.)

Benefits of such a change:

• A more effective and engaging Blood Price mechanic, a slew of Defiance mechanics, and a fair bit of stuff to be done with Shield Oath and maybe even Samurai's parry, Monk's earth stance, and Ninja's shadow and wind techniques.
• Literally every debuff can be used in-combat to produce up to roughly twice* its would-be damage as damage prevented, regardless of whether it's on a mob or boss. The greater the damage effected, the lesser and/or shorter the effect. Given same mob damage per second, the lesser the duration, the greater the percentile. (*Can be adjusted.)

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Originally Posted by TheRealMadruck

DON'T GIVE THEM MONEY

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It would take an enormous amount of players quitting the game at once to get them to change BLU to a group job in an attempt to lure people back. It's a number so large that it's completely infeasible to ever expect it.

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Originally Posted by TheRealMadruck

DON'T PLAY THE JOB

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It's incredibly unlikely that this would cause SE to rework BLU for group content. Their modus operandi for failed content is to ignore it and pretend it never happened, not to make improvements. The best you could say about the 'ignore the job' method is that it would prevent them from making new limited jobs. BLU would still be screwed though.

SE has already put a ton of effort into making this solo version of Blue Mage, and they have a road map already planned out for at least the first few patches of Shadowbringers, if not the entire expansion (Yoshi-P said BLU would be getting its level cap raised over multiple patches after 5.0). Maybe, maybe they would do a massive overhaul of the job in 6.0 or 7.0, but like I said, the MO of the dev team is to ignore and forget, not improve.

I think the most likely decent outcome for BLU is if it is seen as popular in its current form, and the devs see that there's a reason to keep supporting it and making it better. It'll never be the group job that I and others wanted, but at least it'll be something.

Of course, this boycott discussion is moot anyway. We're just theory crafting here, because nothing we decide to do in this thread is going to make any difference. If the job is fun, people will play it. If it's not, people won't. The devs will respond accordingly to either situation.

That being said, I think anyone who does want to quit the game over BLU being a limited job, or anyone who is going to avoid playing BLU for that same reason, is perfectly justified. I totally get not wanting to pay for a game that's creating content that you don't want, or just ignoring that aspect of the game. But it's an unfortunate reality that neither of these choices are going to turn BLU into a group job. At least not any time within the next couple of years.

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Originally Posted by Extreme

Hate to be that person, but isn't this a multiplayer game?

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Are you in party every single second of your online time? Do you all submit mini cactpot tickets as a party? When one of you wants to craft something, do you all craft the same thing together?

See how the "this is a multiplayer game" point is silly?

What people who are defending the current state of Blue Mage doesn't seem to get is that no one would complain if they added more solo content/wanted to try something new.

But not at the cost of making one of the most requested jobs from the fanbase a mini-game/a half-job that can't even do current content proper. A job you can't even main - that's a real slap in the face for all the people who were looking forward to it. The current implemantation outside of maybe the Masked Carnivale (which is still a gimmick) also sounds like "Overworld Eureka" to me, as you'll have to go around killing a truckload of trash mobs to level/get their skills. Truly fun content.

Personally I didn't even care about BLU as a job and I'm still disappointed, and the fact they seem intent on making MORE limited jobs makes me afraid of things to come. I know for sure I'm not touching BLU with a 10 foot pole unless they make it into a full fledged job.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

I see no reason to assume that they started with aims to create a combat-ready BLU, and -- as naive or egotistic as it may sound -- suspect shortsightedness if they honestly could not find a way to make a "true" BLU work as a content-ready job.

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I'm pretty sure you could suggest your own view of BLU and it would be received "too powerful"/"too weak"/"not faitfhull" complaints at the same time. It's not that easy to create such a versatile job.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

All other jobs could as easily have their skills learned through RNG methods in the open world and specifically designed content and it would not remotely affect their ability to be matched into content.

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First, it would have affected their ability to be useful in content. What would happen to unlucky DRKs that couldn't manage to "drop" their Blackest Night "accreditation" ? And BLU is built upon running around seeking monsters, the other jobs are not. Remove that from BLU and you have simply another hybrid mage.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

competency variation already exists in far greater amounts based on simple player ability alone, even in a guaranteed skillset.

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Yes, more the reason to not add another opportunity for underperforming. Like I said above, be unlucky enough that you can't drop that one mandatory skill and you're screwed. And the people you're paired with in matchmaking are also screwed.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

(Hell, perhaps with a bit more agency in the acquisition process, and more difficult solo content included in the process, people might bother to read their tooltips and understand what rotations work and why, indirectly decreasing the variation in player performance in leveling dungeons.)

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In theory, you're right, but seeing what they did with most jobs in SB, it doesn't seem to be the direction they want for their playerbase.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

But, it hasn't been. Certain skills have been incredibly powerful in the right contexts, but BLU itself has not been overpowered in "every game it appeared on".

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You're right. White Wind and Angel Whisper are overpowered in the context where you need healing. Bad Breath is overpowered in the context where mobs is not immune to status ailments...Blue Mage is so overpowered that they dediced it was worthy a being a Limit Break in two games. There is also something else to consider. BLU frequently has access to more elements that BLM, frequently limited to Fire/Ice/Thunder. In a content where elemental weakness has been removed, BLU would lose that specificity.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Debuff calculation

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I won't lie, it sound extremely convoluted...and it also point how silly "speed" is actually calculated in this game, since your Slow wouldn't actually "Slow" the target.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Benefits of such a change: [LIST]A more effective and engaging Blood Price mechanic, a slew of Defiance mechanics, and a fair bit of stuff to be done with Shield Oath and maybe even Samurai's parry, Monk's earth stance, and Ninja's shadow and wind techniques.

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Problem is, at that point, you're not just creating a new job, you're changing lots of formula in the game. A game that is purposefylly streamlined to be available for a broader audience.

I have gone through all the comments and I wanted to address a few of them:
(if it appears that I am strawmanning, I am not trying to. I am merely paraphrasing the best I can from memory all comments I have read)

"It is better that we get BLU as it is than nothing at all"
This is bad logic. SE currently has a precedent in relation to clear design for the core fundamentals of its Job system. There are many ways BLU could have been implemented while not excluding it from alot of the multiplayer aspects.

"Why are people complaining about how BLU is being designed"
Noone is advocating in any of the posts I have read since the announcement hating on the Carnival idea or the style of acquiring skills. As someone already stated, it is merely the fact that this job is being left out from certain portions of the game that are foundations to FF14's system...one being DF for example.

"Do you know how hard it is to design skills around all of a game's content"
Actually I do, one of my good friends IRL helped design the original combat system for Star Wars Galaxies. Yet he was adamantly against how Jedi were implemented as a sort of a "limited" job in that game and how after backlash from players they opened a pandora's box letting everyone play Jedi that eventually killed that game. As for development, It is difficult...if it has no previous precedent. But since FF14 does have a core system in place, the choices SE has had to make to design BLU to be "unique" could be still attained within it's current structure.

"How do we know that BLU won't be later allowed access"
You are right, we don't. But I have seen what another MMO known as SWTOR did in relation to making content designed for "solo content" did to that game. It practically killed its most dedicated players even if SWTOR retains some numbers. No solo content should never subcede any part of the multiplayer aspect of a Massive MULTIPLAYER Online game.(Yes, SWTOR also was affected by its F2P model, but what I mentioned also effected it further)

Then my favorite comment...
"If don't you like the game, you should just quit"
I have heard this same comment made from individuals for over 20 years now since Ultima Online. Comments like this come from individuals who have nothing intelligent to add to a conversation. Usage of comments like this denotes a lack of empathy IRL for others opinions and perspectives. I am glad that the overwhelming part of FF14's amazing community typically is above these type of short sighted foolish comments.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

Fun fact, in most FF games, Summoner is only a flashier and more mp-expensive Black Mage (Not sure people would like a "faithfull" FF summoner)
But, in most games where Summoner actually has a real "pet", the party literrally go away to let if fight solo. So in a sense, maybe it should have been a Limited Job.

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Yeah. In FFXI Summoner was more Summon-dependant, like in FFX or FFXII.

In FFXI you controled the summon and he did damage for you, or heal for you, buff etc... the player was secondary, doing lower spells.

In FFXIV the "summon" (Egi) is just secondary and less important. A shame :/

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

I'm pretty sure you could suggest your own view of BLU and it would be received "too powerful"/"too weak"/"not faitfhull" complaints at the same time. It's not that easy to create such a versatile job.

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You've tried, then? Thoroughly? Have you see the work of those you'd trust with difficult work attempt it? Don't toss in a slipped premise and pretend its common sense or a widely held myth and pretend its fact.
You've seen other versatile jobs fall flat or be dismantled because of some flaw inherent in being versatile? I can't think of any examples for which that has been true, yet I've seen many a successful versatile hybrid.

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Originally Posted by Reynhart

First, it would have affected their ability to be useful in content. What would happen to unlucky DRKs that couldn't manage to "drop" their Blackest Night "accreditation" ? And BLU is built upon running around seeking monsters, the other jobs are not. Remove that from BLU and you have simply another hybrid mage.

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I never said anything about removing its acquisition mechanic. I very clearly said that everyone could face that same issue and it would do nothing to make them unable to perform in the current climate of instanced combat short of Savage. The acquisition mechanic is a non-issue. People often forget to do their latest job quests and come out fine given the current difficulty. Exchange a forgotten job quest skill acquisition for a forgotten monster-kill skill acquisition and nothing changes. A warning that "You have not yet unlocked all the skills available to you. Do you still wish to queue for duty?" would be apt for both, but is still currently unnecessary.

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Yes, more the reason to not add another opportunity for underperforming. Like I said above, be unlucky enough that you can't drop that one mandatory skill and you're screwed. And the people you're paired with in matchmaking are also screwed.

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No. ... No. We already allow for far, far, far greater underperformance just due to player stupidity in ways that cannot be as easily checked. In that context, refusing to use a traditional acquisition system the potential underperformance of which can be incredibly easily checked is ridiculous.

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In theory, you're right, but seeing what they did with most jobs in SB, it doesn't seem to be the direction they want for their playerbase.

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Well, what's most under fire with BLU, BLU itself, or the direction it indicates? It doesn't take but a page of threads to randomly choose from to find that more players would choose better in-game guides and support tools over dumbing down the game. If the devs continue to favor the latter, that's on them.

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You're right. White Wind and Angel Whisper are overpowered in the context where you need healing. Bad Breath is overpowered in the context where mobs is not immune to status ailments...Blue Mage is so overpowered that they decided it was worthy a being a Limit Break in two games. There is also something else to consider. BLU frequently has access to more elements that BLM, frequently limited to Fire/Ice/Thunder.

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And none of that matters to an MMO. You know what else is OP? Life Surge Full Thrust. Foul. Deathflare. Should I just spam those every GCD? No. Obviously what applies to the turn-based combat of FFI-X will not apply directly to XIV, or we'd all be auto-attacking once every six seconds, for seemingly a Foul every strike.

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In a content where elemental weakness has been removed, BLU would lose that specificity.

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The loss of elements being differentiated by a Pokemon-esque wheel makes virtually no difference to how well elements can be diversified in a toolkit. Your lamenting a specifically poor design to the point of ignoring all others, almost all of which are better. You can integrate elements or similar aspects into a BLU-unique combo system, such that ought take a combination of lower-tier and higher-tier abilities to ramp up an element, "spin" it a certain way, nuke, ride that "spin" onto the next phase of play, etc., etc. You can have spells within a specific element convey specific benefits that then synergize with other elemental schools. You do not need to limit all interactions to Wind beats Fire beats Ice beats Wind || Earth beats Lightning beats Water beats Earth.

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I won't lie, it sound extremely convoluted...and it also point how silly "speed" is actually calculated in this game, since your Slow wouldn't actually "Slow" the target.

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It slows, just by a variable percentage such that the potency you prevent is roughly equal between being used on a squirrel, a colossus, or Omega Weapon. But fair enough; I made a mistake in giving the full details. Here: % = your potency / target's potency. It's a simple ratio.

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Problem is, at that point, you're not just creating a new job, you're changing lots of formula in the game. A game that is purposefylly streamlined to be available for a broader audience.

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You mean, purposely dumbed down... to frequent playerbase complaint. Gutting and hollowing =/= streamlining. Intuitive design =/= convolution.

What's the actual complaint here? That I'd rather a game with so much potential not bore itself into obscurity? If so, you're going to run yourself ragged on these forums ensuring that everyone has the PSA that "SE likes 'em dumb," and without a bit of relevance to show for it.

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Originally Posted by Alien_Gamer

It is an MMO. It's also irrelevant to the fact that sometimes people want to do things by themselves. Not everything needs to be group content in an MMO.

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Well yes, but the fact that a whole class is solo content is ridiculous, especially if its the class that many people wanted to play. The worst part is that we'll probably get even more classes that are locked like that.

What if we were given 2 choices?

Add blue mage to the game as they are, or never add it at all. Since that does seem to be the case.

What would you prefer?

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Originally Posted by Adeacia

What if we were given 2 choices?

Add blue mage to the game as they are, or never add it at all. Since that does seem to be the case.

What would you prefer?

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To many people, these options are one and the same. Imagine a BLU fan who LOVES raiding, but hates the kind of overworld grind you'd have to go through to get BLU's skills with this design. This hypothetical person would not play BLU like that.
Meanwhile, if they had never added BLU at all, that person at least had hope that it would be added eventually. Right now, SE seems intent on not revamping BLU to work with, well. The rest of the game. At least anything relevant. So at best BLU's addition is irrelevant, at worst it's disappointing.

You're basically given a choice to play BLU, or to play XIV.

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Originally Posted by Adeacia

What if we were given 2 choices?

Add blue mage to the game as they are, or never add it at all. Since that does seem to be the case.

What would you prefer?

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This is called a false dichotomy, there are more than just 2 choices. They could easily implement the system as is with the Carnival/skill acquirement still in place. They could streamline the damage of abilities to be in line with other caster classes. They could have designed skill gaining around instance combat similar to what other jobs have in place for the core needed to play BLU and give the option to cosmetically apply a appearance to a set number of skill obtained to appear different similar to SUM egis.

There are numerous things SE could have done...but choose not to. Why? My opinion is this decision is based on money. SE know BLU is a extremely popular class and basing skills around a grind on RNG like relics of the past help maintain players to subscribe into the game. It is that simple....

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Originally Posted by TheRealMadruck

This is called a false dichotomy, there are more than just 2 choices. They could easily implement the system as is with the Carnival/skill acquirement still in place. They could streamline the damage of abilities to be in line with other caster classes. They could have designed skill gaining around instance combat similar to what other jobs have in place for the core needed to play BLU and give the option to cosmetically apply a appearance to a set number of skill obtained to appear different similar to SUM egis.

There are numerous things SE could have done...but choose not to. Why? My opinion is this decision is based on money. SE know BLU is a extremely popular class and basing skills around a grind on RNG like relics of the past help maintain players to subscribe into the game. It is that simple....

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Precisely, it's also a reason why the job is limited to 50 (despite their excuses) to keep people in the 1-50 overworld something that gets a lot of public flack by people claiming the game is dead because there is no one there. The fact that the learning is RNG (something that only appeared in one FF if I'm recalling correctly) is to keep the players there longer to keep up the facade.

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Originally Posted by TheRealMadruck

This is called a false dichotomy, there are more than just 2 choices. They could easily implement the system as is with the Carnival/skill acquirement still in place. They could streamline the damage of abilities to be in line with other caster classes. They could have designed skill gaining around instance combat similar to what other jobs have in place for the core needed to play BLU and give the option to cosmetically apply a appearance to a set number of skill obtained to appear different similar to SUM egis.

There are numerous things SE could have done...but choose not to. Why? My opinion is this decision is based on money. SE know BLU is a extremely popular class and basing skills around a grind on RNG like relics of the past help maintain players to subscribe into the game. It is that simple....

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It's called this is the choice they ARE giving us. Get it like this or don't get it at all. I for one, like that it won't be a normal job as it would just be another generic mage if it was and I would never play it.

People complain about things not changing in this game, then they give us something new, and people complain that it's not the same as everything else. I like the limited job idea for being not a generic job like the rest and look forward to more of them in the future.

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Originally Posted by Alien_Gamer

It is an MMO. It's also irrelevant to the fact that sometimes people want to do things by themselves. Not everything needs to be group content in an MMO.

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You are right, the first MMORG i did play more than 2 years in a row was wow (after testing L1 and EQ for 9-12month each)
And during BC, i had many fun trying to solo some vanilla contents. I also enjoy doing my quests alone as much as possible (hard sometime on vanilla/BC).

like in real life, sometime we want just to be alone, relax on his armchair, reading a book, playing a game etc. Not alltime being with other people.

BUT, with BLU we dont speak about content. But a job. A thing to play the game, the job is the tool we use to do the content. It is not fit to "being solo" or "being for parties" (even if some jobs are strongher than others in solo content).
FFXIV will be the first MMORPG where a job exists only to be soloplayed.

Lots of people say "well, if you don't like the direction BLU is going -- don't play it!"

But I'd ask those people -- what if YOUR favorite class were a limited job? Love bard? Sorry, you can only /perform in mini games at the Mih Khetto Amphitheatre while you go out and learn songs from people's orchestrions or something.

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Originally Posted by Adeacia

It's called this is the choice they ARE giving us. Get it like this or don't get it at all. I for one, like that it won't be a normal job as it would just be another generic mage if it was and I would never play it.

People complain about things not changing in this game, then they give us something new, and people complain that it's not the same as everything else. I like the limited job idea for being not a generic job like the rest and look forward to more of them in the future.

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People complain about a whole assortment of things. People complained that DRK was a tank instead of a DPS like in FF11. People complained that RDM wasn't a pure hybrid class but what we currently have. Guess what Adeacia...hardly noone complains about those things anymore. Why? Because it still follows the same core system that has been in place since ARR with all jobs being accessible to all features in the game.

How is making a caster job that uses monster learned abilities/spells to be used on enemies with a unique mechanic every job SE has made in the past considered "generic"? Is RDM generic on that basis? Or how bout your main WHM since it casts healing spells just like AST/SCH, is that generic?

No need to worry, I am staying far away from this crap. I see the game the dev team is playing.

Under pressure from higher ups about innovating new content >>> Brew up new content of "Limited Job" >>> Introduce highly-requested Blue Mage job as part of this new system to lure players into it >>> Set spells to be learned at low "drop" rates to force grinding (and re-subs!) >>> Claim high play times on BLU mage and successful new content >>> Claim Limited Job system is a wild success! More Limited Jobs to come! "Please look forward to it!"

I for one am ok with the limited job thing. They are finally trying something different in FFXIV and we all know how people would complain about the job when raiding and how bad balancing would probably be.
Question i have however is will they be adding Blu Mage specific content because of this, and how much time would be spent on it over adding other content i guess

Plus, if they continue adding this kind of job in the future -- how much of any given patch will be devoted to:

Blue Mage-only content
Beastmaster-only content
Puppetmaster-only content
Geomancer-only content

Can you imagine? "Sorry guys, we had to cut back to one expert dungeon per x.5 patch to make room for all the class-limited content" - it's a scary thought!

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Originally Posted by Stormfur

Lots of people say "well, if you don't like the direction BLU is going -- don't play it!"

But I'd ask those people -- what if YOUR favorite class were a limited job? Love bard? Sorry, you can only /perform in mini games at the Mih Khetto Amphitheatre while you go out and learn songs from people's orchestrions or something.

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In a sort of an aside point I think Bard could be an example of where extra is good but the job is still a functioning job. For example with bard you can make music and they're adding to that system. Obviously Blue Mage's is a bit more problematic and in depth system than the music side, but just an example of a job + extra content is great. (Problematic because you have to solve a few combat related questions, unlike bard's custom music).

Used Beastmaster before but I'm sure people would think Beastmaster + animal tame / husbandry on top of that could be a neat extra treat for everyone (may not main beast but you still might utilize it). But Beastmaster = WoW's mininon system (basically it's pokemon lite) and that's it.. would probably greatly annoy fans who wanted to play it as a job. Puppeter coming with craft a customize-able minion (based off your puppet's look, so you could have your puppet out as a minion while playing Bard for example (non-combat)).

Which is why if they did it sort of like above I'd be okay with this in patches:

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Originally Posted by Stormfur

Blue Mage-only content
Beastmaster-only content
Puppetmaster-only content
Geomancer-only content

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(More so than I would be in other MMORPGS especially since you can change jobs whenever lol, yay for the job system)

Since adding more to Beastmaster would be more like new creatures to tame / breed (what have you). New parts for the puppetmaster, which in turn could also mean new minion customization / side content.

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Originally Posted by Adeacia

It's called this is the choice they ARE giving us. Get it like this or don't get it at all.

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Yeah, and it makes it real easy to drive a particular narrative when people don't call you out on your fallacies. There are far fewer mutual exclusives than they try to sell us on.

What's next, we can't have an engaging open world and engaging instances at the same time... despite near perfect transferability of mechanical assets?

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People complain about things not changing in this game, then they give us something new, and people complain that it's not the same as everything else.

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"I'll thinking of a number between 1 and 10."

"6?"

"Too high."

"4?"

"Too low."

"Well Clearly This Is Impossible!"

No. Saying that a particular development went too far only to say the next went too short does not mean the playerbase is impossible to please. It simply means development hasn't hit the mark yet.

The majority of complaints occur when something has glaring issues.

It does not matter that Eureka is not dungeon or trial content. It matters that it had, and still has, massive flaws. It matters that it does not intersect with other content except via tome acquisition. It matters that its issues accumulate with every new entry because one must grind their way through each entry previous to it. It matters that it came off as half-assed.

When players then sigh that the time allocated could have been better spent on dungeons, they are not necessarily -- or even likely -- asking for the exact same design template we're used to. Rather, dungeons are more bite-sized content that can be more easily differentiated, and the development of systems augmenting them (it seems damn near impossible not to have run into the Mythic + analogy at some point since late-Heavensward) would ultimately offer far more hours of enjoyable content than a massive side-project that nonetheless lacks the polish and sense enough for satisfying gameplay after creating its unique systems.

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Yeah, and it makes it real easy to drive a particular narrative when people don't call you out on your fallacies. There are far fewer mutual exclusives than they try to sell us on.

What's next, we can't have an engaging open world and engaging instances at the same time... despite near perfect transferability of mechanical assets?


"I'll thinking of a number between 1 and 10."

"6?"

"Too high."

"4?"

"Too low."

"Well Clearly This Is Impossible!"

No. Saying that a particular development went too far only to say the next went too short does not mean the playerbase is impossible to please. It simply means development hasn't hit the mark yet.

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Damn Shurrikhan my only regret is that I have but one like to give. I've been trying to express just that thought to those who keep offering this flawed bimodal construct but you, as they say, hit the nail on the head. Thank you.

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Originally Posted by Elerus

Likewise moving the goalpost won't with me. But I'll assume you wish to converse in good faith. So, allow me to help you. I will now quote verbatim what you wrote earlier:



Square, by your own admission, cannot entertain "my" idea because it takes too many resources. In fact you then point out they cannot even adequately handle or balance the jobs present in the game at this moment. Therefore, since Square are already in your own words overburdened it makes no sense for them to add any additional new jobs - Blue Mage or otherwise.

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That's still stretching and distording that I've said to a ridiculous degree. Jeez.

They can do things.
They can't do everything.

How does that translates into me saying that they shouldn't make anything at all because they are overburdened? That's absolutly not what I'm saying. I won't repeat myself a third time.

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Originally Posted by Fyce

That's still stretching and distording that I've said to a ridiculous degree. Jeez.

They can do things.
They can't do everything.

How does that translates into me saying that they shouldn't make anything at all because they are overburdened? That's absolutly not what I'm saying. I won't repeat myself a third time.

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Feel free to repeat yourself as often as you like - it's a public forum. You may want to give the full context of the quote to which I was responding, however. I cannot help but notice it was omitted.