I like BLU a lot after 5.15, but BLU being restricted is making XIV less fun for me

I did not enjoy BLU in patch 4.5, so I've been avoiding it for a long time now. But I've finally gotten around to leveling it to 60 and testing out the 5.15 changes, and I feel that the job has vastly improved and is much more fun to play. I enjoy the fact that there's a more distinct rotation now, that there's new incentives for partying with other BLUs and keeping content synced, and also the ability to take on distinct and proper Party Roles via Mimicry and the new L60 spells.

But that's the problem — I'm having a lot of fun with BLU... until I hit a brick wall and can't do anything else with it because of all the restrictions on content participation. This is frustrating and disappointing. I've now put as much or more effort into BLU as I have any other War/Magic Job: completing job quests, acquiring actions, setting up HUD/keybinds, learning how to do my role properly (or in this case, all three), practicing my rotation(s), setting up a proper gearset... etc... Except unlike every other War/Magic Job, the payoff just suddenly stops after I clear out the niche content that I'm allowed into.

To be clear, it's not that things like Blue Log or Mightier Than... Achievements aren't engaging. It's that none of it makes up for the fact that, despite all this effort setting up and learning BLU, I can't just go with my friends into whatever content we feel like doing for the night. It's frustrating. It feels like a partial waste of energy with no real payoff beyond novelties like (one) mount, or ruining the lives of Yo-Kai farmers (PSA: don't actually do this, please BLU responsibly).

I enjoy this job a lot — the aesthetic, the design, the systems, the characters, etc. I've used a BLU, or Blue Magic, in my party in every previous Final Fantasy game that I played, because I just like the job that much. I would like to main BLU. But, I can't, because it has all these bizarre gimmicky restrictions on it that other Final Fantasy mainstay jobs like RDM or DRK do not.

Here's the thing: it is true that BLU is "overpowered" in certain content, and it is true that BLU has its own distinct side content. But I just don't see any of this as actually being worth the downsides of having all these content locks on the job:

BLU is overpowered in low-level content
Okay, that's neat. But I don't honestly care that much, because I could just undersize the content with any level 80 job and accomplish the same thing, except even faster and easier. So BLU is only overpowered at doing premade synced content. But that's a pointless niche outside of specific gimmick achievements/systems designed to bribe you into doing it as BLU. And these are fun... once... but after that, there's not much reason to keep doing it.

BLU has special systems like Blue Log and Masked Carnivale
Okay, but... I don't care. I apologize if this comes across too harshly, because I can see that some developer(s) clearly put a lot of time into this, but for me, Masked Carnivale is an obnoxious gimmick that doesn't really reflect actual XIV battle gameplay, instead being about bringing some gimmicky trick loadout to "solve" each encounter and then never touch it again, because it's boring and annoying. I log in to explore a world and challenge fights with other players, not to lock myself into a single room for a weirdo solo dodging minigame.

Completing the Blue Log is, again, kind of fun... once... but the content is also so easy that it barely feels like I'm doing much, and once it's done and the achievements are gained, there's just not much reason to bother doing it again. Also, Poetics and Allied Seals are just not very interesting or appealing rewards.

Mightier Than... achievements are definitely a trip and something challenging to work on over time, but once again — it's a one-and-done thing. There's just not much incentive to keep doing this, which makes BLU effectively die off after a short novelty period. It's also something that requires so much preparation and coordination that it's not viable to just hop into with friends for an hour before bed, in the way that I could do a level 80 Roulette or Extreme Trial or something.

The big problem here is that I would value any or all of the following things more than I currently do any of the "advantages" that BLU supposedly has right now:

• The ability to do storyline, MSQ, side quests, etc, so that my character gets to actually be a Blue Mage, rather than a (not blue mage) who sometimes becomes a BLU in ancient ARR/HW content.
• The ability to jump into Roulettes, Dungeons, Trials, Raids, Maps, etc with pugs or friends... like I can do on every other iconic Final Fantasy Job in XIV.
• The ability to challenge myself in actual current, relevant content with current, relevant rewards, like Extreme and Savage, with BLU... rather than having to hope that 7 other people want to downsync into mostly-pointless old content for some reason.

In patch 4.50, I viewed BLU as a complete disaster and not even worth talking about. I just wrote it off as a lost job. With the 5.15 changes, it's almost more frustrating, because BLU's rotation and DPS style are beginning to come together into something that's actually challenging and engaging, and genuinely feels "like a Final Fantasy Blue Mage", but done in XIV's MMO style — in other words, the same thing as eg, Red Mage. Except Red Mage is allowed to actually play the game.

Basically, the point of this big wall of feedback is to try to express two big points:

• I really like the way BLU is growing and evolving. It's starting to feel like a "real" Blue Mage to me, and I'm enjoying playing it. The job itself is becoming a lot of fun for me.
• I really don't like all of the awkward, artificial restrictions on BLU. I want to level it to 80, I want to play it in level 80 content, I want to be able to join whatever my friends are running like I can on any other level 80 War/Magic job.

I can only speak for myself, but my current problem is that — unlike other, level 80 combat Jobs — BLU hits this point where I've "used up" what I can do, and now I have to make an unpleasant choice between giving up on doing relevant content, or giving up on playing the Final Fantasy job that I want to play. It just feels so... "anti-fun", I guess. It feels so at odds with the inclusive, accessible nature that XIV has had up to this point.

Again, I can only speak for myself personally, but I would happily give up as much of BLU's "overpoweredness" as necessary in exchange for being allowed to actually level up, do the MSQ, and do relevant max-level content as Blue Mage. The selling point for me is just BLU's particular style, aesthetic, and systems — mostly the same reasons someone else likes being a Red Mage or a Dragoon or a White Mage or whatever. These are iconic Final Fantasy jobs, and having one carved out and locked into a bizarre little cage just feels really awful to me in the end.

So, to conclude, let me stress that this frustration and disappointment is not with BLU itself — which I'm enjoying a lot, even if it still has some rough edges — but instead with the restrictions on BLU that force me to choose between either being BLU, or being able to participate in all the content in the game.

I think that BLU could still work as the "build-a-bear" Job even as a level 80, full-content Job. Change the "any 24 spells" system into a system of specific slots, and allow players to customize within there. It doesn't have to have a huge point, the fun is just in being allowed to do it at all — same as RDM being able to Vercure. Flavor and style means a lot.

For example, let's say BLU keeps its "Condensed Libra" DPS system at level 80. You could give BLU fixed spell-type slots:

• Physical: choosing between weave-friendly Sharpened Knife, high-range Abyssal Transfixion, or cleaving Kaltstrahl. No matter which one is selected, players will still be able to do their job. It's just flavor and optimization.
• Astral: same idea
• Umbral: same idea
• damage over time: could be a choice between Song of Torment, Bad Breath, etc.
• power boost: Bristle, Whistle, etc. Choose one.
• primal slot A: basically what we already have — choose one of two actions with a shared cd (Eruption or Feather Rain)
• primal slots B/C/D/etc: same idea
• healing slot: choose between White Wind, Pom Cure, Gobskin, etc.
• defensive slot: choose between Mighty Guard (reworked), Diamondback, etc.
• (etc)

In this way, you could give BLU a proper and "balance-able" level 80 rotation with predictable potency/DPS targets for designers to balance around, while preventing players from showing up with a non-functioning loadout, and still allowing players the fun of customizing their BLU loadout, and also still have incentive to go collect actions (because, eg, having Sonic Boom is valuable in a high-movement encounter, while Abyssal Transfix would be valuable if an encounter forces you out of melee range constantly... etc).

I don't know. I'm not a designer. I'm just frustrated, and I feel like a job as iconic to Final Fantasy as BLU/Blue Magic deserves better than the current state of restriction that it's forced into. At the very least, I would be a happier player.

In the beginning, I had a vastly different expectation on the Masked Carnivale than what we actually got. First of all, even the name "Masked Carnivale" implies something vastly more fun and entertaining. I was expecting that to be a group of Blue Mages running through a weekly gauntlet of bosses, each needing to adapt their spells to one another to bring different necessities needed to clear as a group. It would be this extremely elaborate arena filled with decorations, balloons, giant masks and statues--something kinda like the Alter of Uznair. Maybe there are gimmicky fights, but they're all random and you need to coordinate with your team to try and cover different gimmicks while still being a functional team, and you'd get all kinds of rewards from large sums of gil to tomestones, mounts, glamours, hairstyles, etc.

What we actually got is so much less interesting than what I assumed.

I never even understood why it was a limited job in the first place, just make it a proper DPS job that has a normal rotation but have the spells be thematically similar to mob abilities i.e. Bad Breath being a standard DoT and Mighty Guard being a small partywide defensive CD. Is that not the same way they solved the RDM dilemma?

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Originally Posted by waifugenerator

I never even understood why it was a limited job in the first place, just make it a proper DPS job that has a normal rotation but have the spells be thematically similar to mob abilities i.e. Bad Breath being a standard DoT and Mighty Guard being a small partywide defensive CD. Is that not the same way they solved the RDM dilemma?

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This would end up just being a new job in the game rather than it's own content in the game.
Getting the morbol mount was one of the most fun things I have done pertaining to a specific job. If BLU was just a normal job like you describe, this wouldn't have ever been able to happen.

I would like to see them open up POTD for BLU I think that would be a lot of fun to attempt in an all BlU party and maybe even have a specific achievement for completing it in a BLU party.

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Originally Posted by Canadane

This would end up just being a new job in the game rather than it's own content in the game.
Getting the morbol mount was one of the most fun things I have done pertaining to a specific job. If BLU was just a normal job like you describe, this wouldn't have ever been able to happen.

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Getting the morbol mount is very similar to man mode (8 tank) runs though, even UCOB has been cleared by a group of 8 tanks, yet tanks are not limited jobs despite being to clear content like blu can

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Originally Posted by ReiMakoto

Getting the morbol mount is very similar to man mode (8 tank) runs though, even UCOB has been cleared by a group of 8 tanks, yet tanks are not limited jobs despite being to clear content like blu can

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Far from it. "Man mode" runs seem impressive until you realize that tanks are inherently nearly twice as tough as any dps even before using cooldowns and have healing capabilities comparable to healers. 8 Tanks can fail or ignore a lot of mechanics with all members surviving that normal compositions must perform. DpS is the only real factor limiting "man mode."

The Morbol Mount involves clearing content with 8 members of one the least durable job types. DpS isn't a problem, the challenge is complete built around figuring out how to handle mechanics that can easily kill most if not all of the party if messed up.

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Far from it. "Man mode" runs seem impressive until you realize that tanks are inherently nearly twice as tough as any dps even before using cooldowns and have healing capabilities comparable to healers. 8 Tanks can fail or ignore a lot of mechanics with all members surviving that normal compositions must perform. DpS is the only real factor limiting "man mode."

The Morbol Mount involves clearing content with 8 members of one the least durable job types. DpS isn't a problem, the challenge is complete built around figuring out how to handle mechanics that can easily kill most if not all of the party if messed up.

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Not sure where you get the idea that Blue mage isn't durable. The only thing they are missing is HP, which is probably why they have the strongest Defensive cool down in the game that isn't a invun and they have about the same amount of healing as the tanks, if not way more.

I'd rather they get rid of the mount and just made the job. SE needs to stop making side content that only lasts for a bit and then quickly dies off. The fact they made a job attached to this is extremely disheartening

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Originally Posted by Ultimatecalibur

Far from it. "Man mode" runs seem impressive until you realize that tanks are inherently nearly twice as tough as any dps even before using cooldowns and have healing capabilities comparable to healers. 8 Tanks can fail or ignore a lot of mechanics with all members surviving that normal compositions must perform. DpS is the only real factor limiting "man mode."

The Morbol Mount involves clearing content with 8 members of one the least durable job types. DpS isn't a problem, the challenge is complete built around figuring out how to handle mechanics that can easily kill most if not all of the party if messed up.

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Tanks do not have healing capabilities comparable to healers, the strongest tank heals are nascent flash and clemency, one of those isn't even present for man mode ucob (flash which is the stronger of the two) and the other costs dps to use, and as you said, dps is the "only" limiting factor, saying its comparable to healer healing is laughable, compared to healers who can ogcd their way through most fights in the game outside of some heal checks

As for blu being not durable, are you kidding? Tank BLU is the only role in that setup which lacks durability compared to your average tank, for everyone else you are taking less damage on average than in a standard comp easily, you can easily keep bad breath up with 100% uptime, gobskin costs next to no mana and is a stronger average shield than succor or noct helios, and you can have 88% uptime on both addle and conked, through all of that you're lucky if any raidwides hit for more than 50% of your health, and guess what, if you're above 50% health literally any blu in the party can juice the whole party up to full health with a white wind (talking about kits comparible to healers, blus have got ww and exuviate which is 2 more aoe heals as a tank party has, that being zero). To top all that off, everyone could take diamondback and almost tank invuln if its needed. Edit: not even included here the other survivability tools like devour, avail ect.

If you're trying to diminsh manmode runs and say that blu runs are harder or more impressive, I need to call into question your game knowledge and experience.

Edit 2: you also seem to mention tanks being able to fail mechanics and power through and clear regardless, whilst this may be true for say an ex trial, in savage and ultimates this is certainly not the case as in a lot of cases failing the mechanic will deal so much damage nothing short of invulns from multiple party members will save you, and in other cases will give you a damage down debuff, which need I remind you is a run killer for all tank runs battling the enrage timer