#JusticeForBlueMages

An update for Dawntrail was announced, and now none is coming. Honestly, I don’t really understand that. A Blue Mage update doesn’t have to be some massive system overhaul. Ten additional levels, a few new spells, maybe a couple of new Masked Carnivale stages or some interaction with current content that would have been completely realistic. Exactly those kinds of smaller updates are what kept Blue Mage alive in the past.

https://i.redd.it/sstji7z3uuog1.png

Even if a larger internal rework or even a full remake of the job might be planned, a transitional update could still have been released. Because the core issue isn’t just job balance. it’s simply having more content that Blue Mage can actually play.

Precisely because Blue Mage is a “limited job,” it thrives on new goals: collecting new spells, solving new challenges, experimenting with new possibilities. Without updates, that content simply stagnates.

And yes, as a player, I’m honestly quite disappointed. I’ve been playing this game for over twelve years, and this is the first time I’ve genuinely felt pushed away by a development decision. I’m fully aware that the EU community team isn’t responsible for this. Still, it feels frustrating when a previously announced feature simply doesn’t arrive in the end.

In this case, a simple “we’re sorry” from the leadership unfortunately isn’t really enough for me. If an expansion has two years of development time, then at least a small update for an existing job should be something that can be planned.

I’m posting this feedback here deliberately even though I know the chances are small that it will be read beyond the community management level. Still, I wanted to express this clearly as a player.

Let me say this bluntly right from the start: just because Blue Mage isn’t a mainstream job doesn’t mean it can simply be forgotten.

For many of us, Blue Mage is a unique part of FFXIV. It would be a real shame if this job were simply left to stand still.

I wanted so many things. I wanted limited job roulettes! I wanted to meet the Whalqee. I wanted BLU limit break, and to get it from Seat of Sacrifice. I wanted to be able to solo the blue log, if done sync'd and solo. I wanted changes to Aetheric Mimicry and Basic Instinct. I wanted BLU to have separate achievements for Criterions, Deep Dungeons, and maybe even Ultimates.

I knew I wasn't going to get any of it. :( That stuff requires a budget. And even if I did get it, then I would be happy while 25% of the player base would be angrily yelling "WHY DON'T YOU SPEND THE BUDGET WHERE I CARE ABOUT IT!". Yeah, yeah.

But I really did expect the minimum. Level cap 90. Short quest line ending in job gear that looks basically like the 7.3 crafter gear. (But then I fill most slots with 660 poetics/Panda gear anyway.) One Masked Carnivale fight that I play only once. Zero new skills. And the ability to enter EW duties with whatever cookie cutter achievements.

To then not get the minimum, really sucked. I'm not going to exaggerate.

So my copium now, is that it's somehow better this way. Maybe the bare minimum update was actually worked on and finished, but it sucked, and Yoshi-P cancelled it because the backlash over the BLU update sucking would have been worse than the backlash over it being cancelled. Maybe the new skills (if any) were less impactful than the EW update. Maybe too many EX trials were unwinnable for whatever reason. And actually, I already know the Pandamonium raids are going to suck without changes to Mimicry. (Too many role mechanics.)

Whatever we get in patch 8.15 (more copium) has got to be good though.

The fact alone a budget problem was mentioned either means there was no way around admitting it to the investors and shareholders (because let's face it: liveletters and announcements are primarily to show the aforementioned there's some effort going into what they're investing into when they're not low-key threatening their playerbase with consequences on their opinions and spoken word; if they wanted to reassure their playerbase, it'd be more evident) OR it's to garner sympathy, of which I have little of left; if the budget isn't going into FFXIV, that's not the players' fault nor should be their concern (even if it's understandable they decide to be; the developers, the team, they're all human but their announcement stance pretends they aren't capable of making errors or acting out of conduct) and that's entirely on SQEX to come forward with. The side content we've been sold on and promised, even as mild a case as not delivering on BLU updates for the selfsame expansion they promised would have them, then that means ANYTHING they promise in the future cannot be trusted and thusly cannot be a basis of pre-ordering future expansions. "Look forward to" is now to be heavily scrutinized because there is no stock or incentive into delivering what was stated to be part of an already-sparse expansion stretching itself too much and too far.

If they won't deliver on BLU because all of that manpower had to go to lvl 50 BST (which requires Dawntrail at least to have) despite saying they would, then the situation is already dire enough as it is. But that's not the players' fault. So once they stop treating it like it is and become more open with their dire situation (which would cost shareholder and investor faith but would reignite the players that far outnumber them), then I'm going to have to give the cold shoulder on principle and not cope on any goodwill they gesture. Is this taking it out of context? No, I don't think so, nor do I think it's overexaggerated. You fail to deliver on something you promise, even a small thing, and it snowballs into much bigger things until eventually they simply stop promising anything so they don't feel the weight of responsibility (much like how Blizzard Entertainment went).

Of course it was a lie. They're level-locked out of their own homeland!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by VictorSpoils

Of course it was a lie. They're level-locked out of their own homeland!

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This was the part that really made me scratch my head… we’re really not going to have BLU in the expansion in the place they came from? I mean even a little story questline to tide us over til they actually get around to doing the actual update would have been better!

Also odd to me that BST is only going up to 50… I don’t know why I had it in my head that maybe BLU and BST could participate in some things together, both being limited classes, but I guess that won’t be a thing if they’re so uneven in level cap.