BLM Question

so im practicing my BLM loops right?

and then while debating how to have my skills organized to help my brain complete my loops and a question hit me.

For the AOE loop,

do you *Fire II (repeating) > Thunder IV > Blizzard II > Freeze > Loop*?

Or do you *Fire II > Thunder IV > Blizzard II > Loop*?

i do the former cause that was i was taught and what the game seems to want out of me but i find myself not landing some of my AOEs cause my target (BLM needs a target to cast any attack) dies by the rest of my party and since i dont have a target anymore the cast gets interrupted leaving me to restart my cast on another enemy. should i stick to damage while potentially getting a cast cut short by a dead enemy anyway?

BLM AOE is a literal pile of garbage that makes no sense

The actual optimal BLM rotation is as follows

Freeze->clip transpose->flare->flare->flarestar->clip transpose->freeze (refresh thunder as necessary)

High fire and high blizzard are never optimally used

Technically speaking if there are more than 5 targets, and you have to clip to go into fire phase, using High Fire II is I believe a slight gain.

If you find yourself not landing attacks because the one you are attacking is dying, perhaps try re-targeting the one with the highest HP for the next spell when you are casting (target snapshot when you start casting, swapping mid-cast only affects the next spell).

pardon my lack of understanding but "clip" transpose? might is ask what you mean by clip?

I think some people word it that way because as a 2.0s cast with a 2.5s GCD, you technically should not weave an oGCD like transpose afterwards, it'll cause a slight delay after the GCD finished until you can use the next spell. But it's still better to do it this way, because of the incredibly low damage output of High Fire and High Blizzard, hence just transposing even if it means losing a little bit of casting time is better.

(man I wish they'd just rip out the AoE parts of BLM entirely, nearly all the single-target spells already look like they have small~medium AoE radii, so I'd just make them work like that in fact and rather re-use the current AoE spells to mix up the entire rotation)

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Originally Posted by ToxieDrop

while debating how to have my skills organized to help my brain complete my loops and a question hit me.

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It feels complicated at first but when you do it, you realize there's almost no other way to do it and in the current version of the game, what you press next mostly highlights.

High Blizzard II > High Thunder II > Foul > Freeze > High Fire II > Flare > Flare > Flare Star

Thunder is just in case it needs refreshing. Foul can be activated from the start with Amplifier from level 86.

So let's break down how this works:

• Blizzard II restores your MP, so you can eventually use Fire and cast Fire faster.
• Freeze grants you Umbral Hearts, so fires consume less MP.
• Fire II puts you into Astral Fire, so your fire attacks are stronger (including Flare).
• Flare is a very powerful AoE attack, consuming all your MP...unless you have Umbral Hearts, so Umbral Hearts allow 2 of them.
• Flare Star is available at level 100 after doing all those.
• Thunder is just used to keep the DoT up from start of pull, otherwise skip.
• Foul consumes those purple crystals in your job gauge, powerful AoE.

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i find myself not landing some of my AOEs cause my target (BLM needs a target to cast any attack) dies by the rest of my party and since i dont have a target anymore the cast gets interrupted leaving me to restart my cast on another enemy.

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Unfortunately, this just happens. I strongly recommend that you target an enemy with the most health, closest to the center of the pack, if possible. If the enemies die quickly, the content is a joke anyway ie. ARR and Heavensward content, which often don't scale well due to battle system changes over the years.

Transpose can switch to Umbral Ice and Umbral Soul can help you build Umbral Hearts and restore MP when out of battle, such as between mob packs.

All casts now have an equivalent single target version on BLM. So you can resume your rotation with the respective single target versions if a boss is next:

Blizzard III > High Thunder > Xenoglossy > Blizzard IV > Paradox > Fire III > Fire IV x6 > Paradox > Despair > Flare Star

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Originally Posted by ToxieDrop

might is ask what you mean by clip?

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Normally, you weave "Abilities" between "Spells" while the "Spells" are on cooldown. If you press an Ability instead of a Spell, it delays said spell from being used for a bit. This is usually regarded as not being optimal, but in this specific scenario, it's a way to increase damage in a way Square Enix obviously did not intend.

The reason it has to clip is because Black Mage casts are very long and it is difficult to weave an Ability between some of them.