Black Mage for max level/endgame content?

So, I was thinking about giving Black Mage a shot; it was the job of a friend of mine, but he quit the game a while back, so I decided to grab the job in his stead. Unfortunately, I have very little idea of how the job is supposed to be at endgame; I know the basics of the job, like putting down ley lines and such, but I still have a very long way to go.

Basically, what I wanted to ask, is; how does Black Mage play at max level, in endgame content? My main concern is mobility; I notice that plenty of bosses and trials at endgame tend to have massive attacks that require you to move a lot to stay alive, so I'm a little concerned at how the job is supposed to fare.

It's a job where a lot of fight knowledge is required to maximize your damage. This of course doesn't mean you cannot still play it. You have two triplecasts as well as swiftcast for heavy movement phases.

Edit: Xenoglossy is also instantcast (and foul at high levels)

BLM is widely considered to be the hardest job in the game to play due to its restrictive mobility options, though currently RDM is even less mobile than BLM, BLM does still have longer cast times on Fire 4 and Despair that you have to account for. That means the skill cap varies considerably on a fight-by-fight basis, as you need to know and plan when you need to move and how you will way before you need to in order to maximize damage dealt. Two Triple Casts, Xenoglossy, Thundercloud, Swiftcast, Paradox, Aetherial Manipulation and Between the Lines are your mobility tools that you will be making heavy use of constantly. Triplecast and Swiftcast are actual direct DPS gains (as Fire 4 and Despair have longer cast times than the GCD), so you need to plan around which is more of a DPS loss between using them strictly for movement on upcoming mechanics, or using them to prevent cooldown clipping.

It's immensely satisfying when you master the job, if only their DPS reflected it properly, BLM should be top DPS in the game and above SAM for these reasons.

However, the basic core rotation of BLM is very simple as if you're just hitting a training dummy and never need to move. All the complexity and skill comes in planning your movements.

Well, mildly concerning, given that it's going to be my new DPS main; I'm going to be taking the job all the way to 90, so I can run it in some future raids. I'm not discouraged; bit nervous, but I've made my choice, and I'm sticking by it.

It's deffo the most fun job to me, but it's a nightmare to optimize for sure. If something unexpected forces me to move and interrupt my rotation everything falls apart and I mistime everything, buffs fall off etc I and gotta start over.

But damn is it good when you nail it...

I can't imagine wanting to play anything but BLM.

Don't be afraid of the job. It's considered the "hardest job" in the game just because it is the most unique.

Practice your core rotation. Practice your Astral Fire Phase. Practice your Umbral Ice Phase.

Astral Fire: Fire 3 -> Fire 4 (3x) -> Paradox/Fire 1 -> Fire 4 (3x) -> Despair
Umbral Ice: Blizzard 3 -> Blizzard 4 -> Thunder 3/ Xenoglossy (depending if Thunder 3 has run out or you're overcapping on Xenoglossy)

Once you're used to it. Try and integrate movement into it. Look up slidecasting. Try and slidecast every spell you do.
It's okay if you interrupt it. It's a process. Just keep going and vibe with it.

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Once you're used to slidecasting, try looking into specific "weave" spots where you can press your OGCDs.

One common one is the transition from Fire 3 -> Blizzard 3 or Blizzard 3 -> Fire 3 (if you have Astral Fire 3 or Umbral Ice 3 respectfully).
Try and pop your Leylines around that time. Try and pop your triplecast around that time. Try and pop your sharpcasts around that time.
Hell, be adventurous and pop your Swiftcast to do cheeky movement.
Doesn't matter if sharpcasting your Fire 1/Paradox is "suboptimal", that's fine. You're just getting used to it. Keep going.

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Once you get past that. Get into content. Try and do your rotation in Normal Raids.
You'll start seeing that those weave spots are also windows for you to move. Your sharpcasted spells can be used for movement. Your Xenoglossy is used for movement etc...

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After this it's just you deciding on how you play your Black Mage. If you wanna be cheeky and do Transpose Paradox shennanigans. If you wanna be a fast casty but no crit boi, if you wanna be a slow casty but very critty boi. If you wanna be a greedy boi that uses triple cast on cooldown and just slidecast to safety, or do you like keeping one charge of triplecast for movement, it's just all up to you.

Just remember that BLM is the only job in the game that learning it is a journey . You're not gonna get it right away overnight like a SMN or a MCH or even just about any job in the game. It's gonna take a bit of time, but trust me it's worth it.

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Originally Posted by Travel

So, I was thinking about giving Black Mage a shot; it was the job of a friend of mine, but he quit the game a while back, so I decided to grab the job in his stead. Unfortunately, I have very little idea of how the job is supposed to be at endgame; I know the basics of the job, like putting down ley lines and such, but I still have a very long way to go.

Basically, what I wanted to ask, is; how does Black Mage play at max level, in endgame content? My main concern is mobility; I notice that plenty of bosses and trials at endgame tend to have massive attacks that require you to move a lot to stay alive, so I'm a little concerned at how the job is supposed to fare.

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BLM has a crapload of mobility tools, but the fact that it's a crapload also means that it's a very big amount of tools to juggle with, and most of them require at least some amount of planning. If anything BLM can stay mobile in long extended mobility phases due to all those tools at disposal, provided you haven't burned through them already.

- Triplecast: 3 insta casts at standard recast, and you'll have to weight if you want to use this for damage during bursts or later for mobility
- Swiftcast: same thing
- Sharpcast: provides thundercloud and firestarter procs, need planning ahead, but it's essentially an insta cast for free
- Xenoglossy: instacast, can juggle with 2 (technically 3 if you already have two banked)
- Ice Paradox: instacast

On top of those you have the non damage related mobility tools that can allow you to move more freely around:
- Between the lines to snap back to leylines
- Aetherial Manipulation to teleport to any ally

Saying which is more mobile between BLM and RDM is tricky, because the melee phase of RDM those days allows for long bursts of mobility as well, but RDM certainly demands a lot less thinking and planning, especially as BLM is extremely starved for weaving slots for OGCDs like its mobility tools, so it's hard to immediately react to a need to move NOW without losing uptime if not planned ahead.