Latest and Greatest Information on Black Mage

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Originally Posted by laanz

2.x blm were like fire1 fire1 fire1 and hoped for firestarter or Thunder procs .. xD enochian made it all more interesting imo

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2.x BLM was easy I agree, maybe too easy, maybe not. There were still plenty in 2.x who did not play right despite its simplicity. Also Enochian as a mechanic that makes the class more interesting I have no problem with.

Problem is how it was executed. Combination of A) F4/B4 still requiring AF / UI during Enochian while not refreshing them, B) potential possibility to keep Enochian alive 100% of the time, and C) timing so tight that bad RNG utterly destroys your DPS does not play out too well. Change one of these for the better and you'd already see vast improvement. See, this isn't so much about making the class easier, it's about making it fair and fun to play; those are fundamentally different things. Gameplay can still be interesting and engaging despite not spitting in your face every few seconds.

So am I the only one that's pretty happy with blm atm?

I think one of the biggest issues with BLM is that we play a reactive class while lvling (reacting to procs) and when you hit 60, not 59, 60, you get a whole different class.

When I realized how enochian works with fiire IV (and god shocked to see it didnt apply AF), it forced me to go to a dummy with a friend and train my rotation for a while.

It was a totally new class. I started to ignore most of TS procs, unless it happens at the exact right moment and kept jugling to keep enochian.

I wont preach to the choir, we all know how hard it can be maintain it on hard content with all that movement and mechanics to deal with it.

If given me the power, in a more realistic change, I'd do a little QoL change so that Fire IV nor Bliz IV cancels mid cast if enochian runs. It is a small change that could help a little. A bigger change would be simply to let TS4 proc, somehow, reapply AF as a bonus effect (So we could actually use it over fire I).

People should know better then to confuse "simple" and "easy". 2.x BLM was "simple" -- excelling was FAR from "easy".

Now, it's neither simple NOR easy (and more difficult then 2.x to boot) -- which is outright worse.

Some people like it. Some people hate it. Some people just think it's awful design and are praying for some type of improvement before they run out of non-class locked pieces to buy. I love BLM conceptually .. and I can work with the 3.0 rotation. I just think it's awful, and don't find it to be an improvement.

Enochian is getting a buff by the looks of it and that thunder is being reviewed too which is great!

0:24:11
Q: It's difficult to maintain Enochian. Are there any plans to change this?
A: Currently, when Enochian is reused, instead of overwriting the amount of time remaining, it shortens the duration first before overwriting the remaining time, and this is what made it hard to maintain. Since we have received a lot of feedback in regards to this, we’ll change this to overwrite the original effect. Additionally, we're looking into making adjustments to the effect of Thunder since it has little effect while using Enochian. For all other points, I believe there are parts that will take a bit of getting used to, so we would like you to first try out Enochian after the change and submit your feedback.

It also appears that its intended for spells to use large sums of your mp.

0:17:31
Q: As the level cap increased our maximum MP also increased, but it feels like the rate of MP consumption has also increased. Will this be fixed as our item levels increase?
A: No, even if your item level increases this will not change. The ratio between the amount of maximum MP increased with the increase of item levels, and the amount of MP consumed has been structured while considering the entire 3.x series. However, we may make some adjustments to specific jobs if there’s a situation where their MP may run out in raids and other end-game encounters.

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Originally Posted by Inosaska

Enochian is getting a buff by the looks of it and that thunder is being reviewed too which is great!

0:24:11
Q: It's difficult to maintain Enochian. Are there any plans to change this?
A: Currently, when Enochian is reused, instead of overwriting the amount of time remaining, it shortens the duration first before overwriting the remaining time, and this is what made it hard to maintain. Since we have received a lot of feedback in regards to this, we’ll change this to overwrite the original effect. Additionally, we're looking into making adjustments to the effect of Thunder since it has little effect while using Enochian.

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These changes already happened. The Q&A Digest posted recently is from an earlier session.

I think dps-wise BLM is fine atm (Not the best at single target or AoE but reasonable for both), what we do need is more utility to make BLM equally desirable as SMN in raids. Currently the choice between BLM and SMN is a no-brainer to be honest.

Well... maybe if Apoc was a 30y caster centered aoe... Help tanks w/ all the fancy magic tank busters...

We're not getting a rez.
We're not getting any kind of group or player dps buff... hell THM/BLM barely has its OWN dps buff, aside from Leylines...

Making Apoc useful for surviving heavy magic damage may be the best we can ask in terms of "utility".

Restoring Manawall would help for a start.

The nerf to Manawall was a horrible decision. I get they didn't want us cheesing mechanics, and for ninja the change makes more sense. And I can even understand it being OP for 2.0 Blm, but now Manawall would be so useful if it blocked a physical attack so we can stay still and get off another attack, possibly a crucial one that refreshes a timer at the last second.