Improvements for Caster Classes (buffsystem, skill activation))

Well im Playing a Conjurer/Thaumaturg since release and it never was easy to handle these classes.


It's a mess to buff all your group mates if you have to recast all buffs each 4 mins (which is not even one guildleve). if all your group members are'nt standing in one place in most of situations only half of the group is receiving buffs. if they are standing just one stair lower than you they won't receive the buff as well.

i think the buff range and duration is too low if you ask me... and there are also some bugs (i only mention stairways)


One other point which is really getting on my nerves (and some other players) is the fact of activating skills since patch 1.19 .. you have to wait till the animation has finished for 100% to cast your next spell.. so i hit one skill for about 3-5 times (when in my opinion the animation has ended yet) and hope that the skill gets initiated.

that was way better in the patch versions before, i dont know why they changed it. there was a little bit of "time tolerance". Since 1.19 the skill activation system doesnt tolerate just 0,5 secs.

Some of my improvement suggestions for casters would be:

- Increasing buff duration from ~4 min to at least a minimum of 10-15 mins.
(its just getting on the nerves of the caster and the group members itself "its bufftime")

- increasing the buff radius range (minimum the double)

- rework the skill activation system like it was in 1.18 and before.
(More tolerance or a spell queue)


- eliminate buff bugs . like when party members are on a different height (stairways for example)

healing group members while in fight and casting attack spells:
- when you select an enemy and a group member afterwards to cure him you always casted cure on the enemy... to deal with this problem you first always had to press "ESC" (deselecting the target)

this problem should be solved as well.. when i'm selecting a group member afterwards and cast cure the group member should receive the cure, not the enemy i had in target before.

sorry if my english isnt that perfect. i hope you understand my concerns ;)

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Originally Posted by Shikaree

I think the DoM should have the ability to remove Spirit/Phantom Dart from their keybind bar, or balance the ability to work more on your magic power stat.

Because if I'm not going to even use this move, why should I have it stuck somewhere on my bars taking up space?

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With respect, even at level 50, do you have enough Skill Points to fill up all three skill bars with useful skills?

I'm not saying it wouldn't be nice to remove, but it isn't really a huge issues to just move it to one of the few empty slots at the end.

You can still do the same thing in XIV no Shikaree? I mean XI had no action bar it was all macros. You still have macros in this game, so why cant you do the same to make it feel kinda the same on XIV?

1) Shell, protect etc all need to be AoE spells, nothing worse than being in single cast mode and wasting a 60 min cooldown timer because you didn't realise which mode you were in.

2) Make Protect and Shell instant cast, people don't want to wait around to be buffed it should be a simple click bam done, make the recast timer 1.50 mins recast and make the spells instant cast.

3) As above said either make the AoE twice the range or buff all party members in the party within a massive range. (something like the range of Ifrits arena)

4) Something I would like to see is a passive Whitemage Trait that buffs party members with shell and protect when within range, it would be a nice trait that only Whitemage would have and a reason to invite one to the party. (not that there wouldn't be a reason :P)

Why not just use the ability? They give it to us for a reason. This whole mages shouldn't attack thing was bull in XI and its even more so bull here.

Jinko you could make a macro that enables and disables aoe for each spell you intend to AOE. I use to do that before i got really lazy cause all my macros got broke due to dated and stuff. Once i get around to fixing all that ill prob go back to using the macros. I agree that the default skill should be unassigned if not needed. But I'm sure its probably stuck atm due to some terrible coding that yoshi-p was talking about. Would be nice to remove it.

It would be nice to have a real buff system.

Each buff should be a toggle (instant, no CD, saved on loggout) and, when up, automatically applied to the whole group until canceled. EQ 2 did that, why can't we have the same here?

If you don't want some buffs to collide, use some kind of uniqueness per categories. If you want a buff to cost mana, translate this cost into a reduced mana regen. If you want to limit the total number of buffs, use a counter.

But having to recast them every 5 minutes is ridiculous. If you want a class whose gameplay is recasting buffs every 5 minutes, make one, but let that gameplay be specific to that class (Rift did that, there is a support class with a dozen of 5 minutes buffs).

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Originally Posted by Wynn

Why not just use the ability? They give it to us for a reason. This whole mages shouldn't attack thing was bull in XI and its even more so bull here.

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well the Weapon skills for mages are really sensless since patch 1.19 they do make MUCH less damage than before. its a joke and no one uses them anymore.

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Originally Posted by Nipa

It would be nice to have a real buff system.

Each buff should be a toggle (instant, no CD, saved on loggout) and, when up, automatically applied to the whole group until canceled. EQ 2 did that, why can't we have the same here?

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well but this wouldnt be final fantasy anymore. protect and shell have been tactic skills even in offline Final Fantasys.. and in offline FF's they do not last very long for a reason.. its a part of the strategy of a battle if they are up all the time, you dont need buffs.

i think it would be enough to increase the bufftime... i think in FF11 it was 10-15 mins? dont know anymore. and the bard job is going to be a supporting class like you described.

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Originally Posted by Drako

Jinko you could make a macro that enables and disables aoe for each spell you intend to AOE.

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Thats not the point though, a macro can't tell the difference if your aoe is switched on or off, so it can cause issues if you are aoe is on when you think is off and vice versa.

Also give me one example when Protect needs to be single target, even when solo protectra would still work the same.

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

well but this wouldnt be final fantasy anymore. protect and shell have been tactic skills even in offline Final Fantasys.. and in offline FF's they do not last very long for a reason.. its a part of the strategy of a battle if they are up all the time, you dont need buffs.

i think it would be enough to increase the bufftime... i think in FF11 it was 10-15 mins? dont know anymore. and the bard job is going to be a supporting class like you described.

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Ah, it's a different story if they want to make them tactical then. In that case a few minutes timer seems way more comfortable (or even less, some games have classes with only 30 second buffs). But I really see that as a specific class gameplay, instead of the basic buff style. I could really see the THM with that kind of gameplay.

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Originally Posted by Tonkra

i think in FF11 it was 10-15 mins? dont know anymore.

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In FFXI Protect and Shell lasted 30 minutes and the other buffs lasted a good while too. Protect and Shell also had a short recast timer too like 5-10 secs? I really hope they make CNJ AoE bigger and increase the duration for AT LEAST Protect and Shell.

Not being able to target people or mobs higher or lower than you is annoying for other ranged attacks as well.

I would not have a problem if they removed the vertical distance between targets from the horizontal theoretical range, but being unable to heal/attack a target that is literally a stair below or above you is frustrating.

Recasting buffs every 5 minutes was addressed by the DEVs already. They stated that they wanted the spells to be powerful.

If they increase duration, reduce cast time or increase range, they would have to reduce its effect to balance.

So choose your poison. If you all REALLY want these things, expect Protect and Shell to be craptastic spells in return.

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Originally Posted by Shikaree

Actually it is what I'm doing. I'm only using the first line of the keybind bar and I'm setting anything that goes on lines 2 or 3 and making macros out of them. Except the awkward spot I have raise set to on my lancer right now.

But it's just why should I have to move around this one skill that's currently not required to really play a class efficiently? I can understand archers still needing light shot, but there's nothing worthwhile going for mages and melee skills now that they weapon damage for next to nothing and they don't even need to draw their weapon to cast now.

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"/eaction 30 Spirit Dart"

That will move Spirit Dart to the last spot on your third action bar. I was frustrated by it for a long time as well, before I realized it could be moved, even if it can't be removed.

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Originally Posted by Wynn

Why not just use the ability? They give it to us for a reason. This whole mages shouldn't attack thing was bull in XI and its even more so bull here.

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Because it makes us draw our weapon, which kills our MP regeneration completely until we put it away. 2 seconds of MP regeneration is about a million times better than the 3-15 damage it'll do. The only non-spell attack mages can justify using is Elemental Shroud/Silhoette, because those reduce enmity (slightly). Even those should only be used if you accidentally pull enmity, because you don't regenerate MP while under attack.

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Originally Posted by Misteyes

Because it makes us draw our weapon, which kills our MP regeneration completely until we put it away. 2 seconds of MP regeneration is about a million times better than the 3-15 damage it'll do. The only non-spell attack mages can justify using is Elemental Shroud/Silhoette, because those reduce enmity (slightly). Even those should only be used if you accidentally pull enmity, because you don't regenerate MP while under attack.

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On what? Are we talking Ifrit here or regular mobs cause that's not my experience in regular mob killing post update. If we're talking Ifrit well... my ARC does about 15 damage per unbuffed light shot arrow to Ifrit too, guess I shouldn't pew-pew.

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Originally Posted by DoctorMog

Recasting buffs every 5 minutes was addressed by the DEVs already. They stated that they wanted the spells to be powerful.

If they increase duration, reduce cast time or increase range, they would have to reduce its effect to balance.

So choose your poison. If you all REALLY want these things, expect Protect and Shell to be craptastic spells in return.

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Thats sounds like bull to me, P&S where both pretty powerful spells in FF11 and they lasted 30 mins, Buffs in WoW are instant cast have massive AoE range and last an hour.

No need to pick a poison if the devs know what they are doing.

Fact is this team sucks when it comes to mages, more so than the FF11 team sucks when it comes to mages, they need to pull their finger out and make mages worth a damn already, I'm getting tired of waiting for my class to be fixed.

Protect in Shell lasting 30 minutes in XI was reasonable. They were powerful, true, but the spells you saw even more impact with lasted for much shorter time.

Phalanx, Stoneskin, Blink, Aquaveil...they had much shorter duration because their effects were more profound. Protect and Shell's effects were noticed over the course of a battle.

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Originally Posted by DoctorMog

Recasting buffs every 5 minutes was addressed by the DEVs already. They stated that they wanted the spells to be powerful.

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Powerful in FF14? HA ;O

Is there anyone playing FFXIV to play Final Fantasy, accept its system and let the devs do their work or are there only people from this and that MMORPG complaining that at this moment not everything in FFXIV is copied from another MMORPG?! I really miss the old not so nerdy times.:mad:

Just try to live with it: not everything will be perfect for everybody. Why do you still play this game if everything is broken for you...

Btw the caster classes will change with next patches.