Black Mage What Need to be Changed and Improved [Discussion & Feedback]

Hello,

Disclaimer: I have made sure to wait for the Summoners to get an official replay before I started this thread. Please, do note this is not a crying thread but a feedback one.

Please do keep in mind this thread is about BLM and not THM. Matter of fact everything that is amazing about BLM is solely because of THM. I also think this is a concern for the whole community and not just BLM players, as the design decisions that were applied to BLM might be applied to your favourite job in the future wither it is released already or not yet.

Lets have a look at the following spells which are the ones BLM get access to as they reach level 50:

1- Convert @ lvl 30:

"Sacrifices 20% of maximum HP to restore 30% of MP. Cannot be executed when current HP is lower than 20%."

I believe this spell was added for two reasons, 1- Flare, 2- when BLM normal rotation is effected by an outside source such as Bard mana song. I can see this spell being part of BLM lore and a good addition so I don't have anything against it.

2- Freeze @ lvl 35:

"Covers a designated area in ice, dealing ice damage with a potency of 20 and binding enemies that enter."

Possibly the very worst spell/skill in the entire game with no competition what so ever. Long cast time that does almost no damage and the bind debuff does not last more than a very short few seconds, what worse is the bind effect breaks as soon as the target is hit by anything. This spell does not have an actual good use in the game to the point many BLMs don't even have it on their bar. I tried to think of any good use, even in Garuda HM but why would I even use it when I can Flare the feathers as they spawn to no health.

I rate it -6 out of 5. Also keep in mind, almost all lvl 55+ monsters fully resist it.

What need to be changed IMO?

I think the dev team should stick to BLM being a nuking class and change the spell into a nuking spell under Umbral Ice III with guaranteed 3-5 seconds bind that actually works in Coil (with diminishing return of course). It will give us a good addition to our rotation and a good reason to actually stay under Umbral Ice III aside form just getting our mana back. I also suggest to have the targeting mechanics switched to Fire II method.

3- Apocatastasis @ lvl 40:

"Increases a Disciple of War or Magic party member's resistance to Fire, Ice, and Lightning by 30%.
Cannot be reused on an individual for 60 seconds from when the effect wears off. Cannot be cast on self."

A very wired support spell for a nuking class. However, that is fine, no one would mind..if it actually had a good use. From just reading the description, you would think Ifirit HM and to some extent ADS (very debatable as it seems High Voltage is actually physical damage and not lighting*). If this spell only had Physical res added to it..if only this spell actually meant anything in Coil...maybe it would have been acceptable for it to be a lvl 40 BLM spell.

0 out of 5 until the day tanks yell "nub BLM y u no Apocatastasis me before da boss kicked my ***" but even then...it is a spell that should have more to it than just tank buff (seriously why would you waste 2 min CD on anyone else except the tank if it had any use except maybe healers in danger).

4- Manawall @ lvl 45:

"Creates a barrier that nullifies two physical attacks."

BLM oh shit button. very powerful and very useful when BLM steal boss aggro. However, this spell is either bugged or something wired going on with ADS. If you know for a fact your group screwed up and High Voltage is incoming use Mana wall, it will cause High Voltage to do 0 damage and protect you from the debuff that comes with it. Which means 1- Hgh Voltage is actually physical damage which render Apocatastasis even more useless or 2- it is a bug.

5- Flare @ lvl 50:

This spell is the only spell in the entire list the represent what BLM is all about, destruction. BLM entire story arc is about destruction and powerful AOE spells, yet this is the only one we get which is absolutely wired.

I have 3 issues with it:

1- The tool tip tells you it uses all your mana, but it does not tell you the minimum requirement. Players estimate it to be around 250-300 mana. We should be informed if it is a % or a fixed number.

2- It does not scale with the amount of mana used to cast it, so burning 3k+ mana on it or just 300 makes 0 difference. It should scale better with the amount of mana used with it, even if it is a small difference so long it is noticeable.

3- The radius is the exact same as Fire 2, for a spell that is supposed to be the strongest AOE it is a bit underwhelming. Please do increase the radius even by 2 points is fine.

Please do share your feedback here and hope a dev notice it.

Thanks for reading and I apologise for any English errors as it is my third language.

1. Yeah, convert is mostly useless except for those rare situations where you don't have any stacks of umbral ice or astral fire, and have no mana to use to gain these stacks. But compared to most other jobs getting 1-2 skills that aren't immediately useful, this is fine.

2. I imagine the point of freeze is so that you can maintain a choke point in PvP, or delay adds from reaching a point. In current content this probably isn't too useful, but may be more important in future content. About the only change they could make to this skill without making it overpowered would be to also apply a heavy debuff to things passing through (in addition to bind) so that it has a more clear and beneficial use. Dropping the cast time down to the standard 2.x seconds would be a good idea as well.

3. This skill is useless for one simple reason... Nothing in the game seems to deal aspected damage. Resistences are virtually meaningless currently. The only thing that seems to make any difference is the generic magic defense from equipment. A better, alternate skill, would be to replace this with a skill that removes 10-20% of a single target's magic resistance.

Nothing else to contribute beyond that.

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Originally Posted by Vagrant-0

2. I imagine the point of freeze is so that you can maintain a choke point in PvP, or delay adds from reaching a point. In current content this probably isn't too useful, but may be more important in future content. About the only change they could make to this skill without making it overpowered would be to also apply a heavy debuff to things passing through (in addition to bind) so that it has a more clear and beneficial use. Dropping the cast time down to the standard 2.x seconds would be a good idea as well.

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If Freeze would work like the tooltip implies I could maybe find some use for it(like your example as a choke point). Sadly either the tooltip is false or the spell is bugged because it doesn't create a field for a duration but only snares mobs who are inside the radius when it fires. It is really the most useless and asinine spell in the game.

Apocatastasis
It's really weak as it only increases resistance and people don't have high resistance because it's not worth it to use resistance materia or gear with resistance in this game. It would be way more useful if it decreased Fire, Ice, and Lightning damage by 30%. Since it only lasts 12s, can only be used every 60s on the same character and has a 2 min CD I don't think it would be overpowered.

Agreed for the most part.

Apocastasis may have a use further down the road. No use changing it dramatically just because current content does not have a specific use for it. They may design content to where it's a nice boon to have a BLM use it.

It would be cool if freeze you know actually caused a freeze status effect on the enemy that does damage over time or that froze them in place for like 3-4 seconds unless they were hit while frozen. This game needs more RPG elements because it is a MMORPG.

Add Elements back to the game its dumb that enemy's fire does fire damage and yours doesn't.

I am not going to lie...I literally use skills 1-4..ehh who am I kidding I don't use skills 1-4 lol.

op use of the word 'wired' is strange to me. Assuming he means 'weird'.

it is odd that blm is given all these supportive abilities that don't go hand in hand with its ability to deal damage. Freeze would actually be decent if it worked as advertised and/or did more damage.

At least 3 of the 5 abilities are functional. :p

Black Mage What Need to be Changed and Improved

6- Enmity Bar @ lvl 1

"Visible indicator which relates the level of enmity the Black Mage has to the various monsters they are in combat with"

I think there should be a bar, somewhere in the lower-left/middle-left of the screen which has each monster's name on it, plus a visible indicator - perhaps a colored shape - that directly tells the player how much enmity they have to the target they are attacking. This would make it much easier for Black Mages to monitor their enmity levels and prevent them from causing wipeouts due to getting a monster's attention over the tank.

What do you all think? Good idea? Bad idea? Should Black Mages have something that they can personally watch themselves to make sure they aren't going to put the whole party in jeopardy of wiping - particularly on HM Titan/HM Garuda or wherever really?

umm.... the enmity list shows your enmity to all the enemies you're in combat with... you don't need a special ability for that...

also we already have enmity bars for oneself and the entire party for your current target, regardless of class.

So i'm not sure if you're aware of that and/or whether you're serious. Because we already have that capability.

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Add Elements back to the game its dumb that enemy's fire does fire damage and yours doesn't.

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uhm.... your fire does do fire damage... I'm guessing you're referring to the fact that enemies don't have automatic resistance to an element that they're "based on." Enemies still have resistances (which can be lowered by foe requiem).