Chad Mages What else would you want right now for our class

Title above explains it most importantly are we perfect the way we are or is a change in order to spice things up?

More lightning spells. Maybe even some sort of lightning based mechanic to shake up our AF/UI phases.

I just want a proper damn bolt spell, please.

The hell is chad mage ?

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Originally Posted by Kahnom

The hell is chad mage ?

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The mortal enemy of Neckbeard Mages...


...I assume they mean Black Mage.

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Originally Posted by Saefinn

...I assume they mean Black Mage.

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Well if that is the case...

Black Mages AoE rotation is a mess until lvl 68 or even 72. They have to fix that.

My suggestion:

Blizzard 2 should be cast on your target (instead of around yourself) and gets later upgraded into Freeze.
Fire 2 needs a serious look at, maybe upgrade it into something like "Burn" wich gives you AF3 so you can switch elements with that instead of Fire 3.
And let us cast ice spells without mana cost at lvl 50, because waiting for the mana tic after Flare is just not fun (and messes up muscle memory when you are synched).

Black Mage is one of the best designed games in the moment right now, however I'd echo what Tint suggested.

Blizzard 2 being changed to low level Freeze normalizes the Umbral Ice phase of Black Mages AOE rotation throughout all levels. Making Fire 2 instantly switch you to AF3 removes the odd quirk of having to either do a Single Target Fire 3 during the AOE rotation to change or having your first Umbral Ice phase Flare being a damage gain in huge packs. Otherwise I think the job is great.

At that point the only two "Bad" skills the job will have are Sleep and Scathe.

It's worth noting that QOL traits we get at higher levels tends to fold back into everything at the next expansion, so I would expect "No MP ice spells" to be baseline by 6.0

Honestly I just want SMN to stop being so clunky to play. I've mained SMN since launch of ARR and have always been loyal (Even in 2.0 where SMN was trash). It's getting really hard to lately due how clunky it feels, their AoE dps feels subpar and clunky.
I honestly just want SMN to be fun to play again and worth the effort of playing a difficult job.
Also...give me Shiva already >;c I've been waiting long enough for the best primal.

For BLM, my wishlist is still largely --

• Make Blizzard 2 upgrade into Freeze, and Fire 2 upgrade into Flare. You get more PPS out of Freeze spam than alternating Fire 2 anyway.
• Combine the button for Enochian with Fire 4 and Blizzard 4; combine the buttons for Ley Lines and Between the Lines; combine the buttons for Despair and Umbral Soul.
• Make Aspect Mastery affect Flare without consuming Umbral Hearts.
• Add a trait to make Blizzard 1 instant, and replace Scathe with a castable survival skill like an enhanced Drain. Expand the trait to make Fire 1 instant after Fire 4 is obtained.

... Which is honestly all QoL stuff.

As far as expanding? I'd like to see Burst/Surge/whatever "Ancient" equivalent there is to Thunder, and maybe a vortex skill like Nyelbert has as a Cardinal Virtue for gathering enemies up before nuking them.

Making fire 1 instant is a buff.

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Originally Posted by Kabooa

Making fire 1 instant is a buff.

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True enough, but largely insofar as it makes timing a tiny bit easier. Potencies wouldn't change, and with the same MP costs, same number of casts.

You'd lose less damage in movement phases compared to using Scathe, but counterpoint, you would have avoided Scathe anyway.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

True enough, but only insofar as it makes timing a tiny bit easier. Potencies wouldn't change, and with the same MP costs, same number of casts.

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It's a fairly good buff. It adds significantly more flexibility and a permanent not-terrible movement option. Basically giving Black mages the same mobility-potency all the time that Summoners only enjoy during Firebird trance, in addition to all the current tools.

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Originally Posted by Kabooa

It's a fairly good buff. It adds significantly more flexibility and a permanent not-terrible movement option. Basically giving Black mages the same mobility-potency all the time that Summoners only enjoy during Firebird trance, in addition to all the current tools.

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And as I said before, we would still avoid using it for movement as much as possible, just like we do with Scathe now.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

And as I said before, we would still avoid using it for movement as much as possible, just like we do with Scathe now.

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Which is untrue. You simply cannot account for all potential movement scenarios. Some, such as Pantokrator or the standard PF strat for Final Omega, for example, required some degree of proc luck in order to deal with several mechanics and lose absolutely nothing.

What this does is effectively allow every single swiftcast and triple to only be used on Fire 4 or Despair, and while that seems obvious, you don't always get that choice. Now, you do.

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Originally Posted by Kabooa

What this does is effectively allow every single swiftcast and triple to only be used on Fire 4 or Despair, and while that seems obvious, you don't always get that choice. Now, you do.

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Doesn't really defeat my point anyway, as buff of any substance or no, it would still also improve quality of life (even if not exclusively) and fits with the thread discussion of "What else I want for BLM."

But fine, "Making fire 1 instant is a buff." And?

Fire 1 could become instant, and the "BLM is an immobile turret" meme would probably still exist.

I'm shootposting of course, but I do agree with Kabooa in regards to that idea, it would be a good quality of life sure, but it makes BLM's minigame of elemental timers kind of...way easier.

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Originally Posted by SpeckledBurd

Black Mage is one of the best designed games in the moment right now, however I'd echo what Tint suggested.

Blizzard 2 being changed to low level Freeze normalizes the Umbral Ice phase of Black Mages AOE rotation throughout all levels. Making Fire 2 instantly switch you to AF3 removes the odd quirk of having to either do a Single Target Fire 3 during the AOE rotation to change or having your first Umbral Ice phase Flare being a damage gain in huge packs. Otherwise I think the job is great.

At that point the only two "Bad" skills the job will have are Sleep and Scathe.

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I hate using Cold Flare instead of F3 in big packs. Why can't F2 give us AF3 like it's counterpart Freeze does?

+1 make F2 usable again, make it give AF3.

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Originally Posted by SaberMaxwell

it would be a good quality of life sure, but it makes BLM's minigame of elemental timers kind of...way easier.

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And as I raise and light my cigar off my thumb with an instant Fire 1 I reiterate: ... that's a problem how?

I did suggest it as an advancement "after you obtain Fire 4." For all I care it's an advancement at level 98 or has an extra long GCD, I'd just rather Fire 1 instead of Scathe, and have any use for Blizz1 really.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

And as I raise and light my cigar off my thumb with an instant Fire 1 I reiterate: ... that's a problem how?

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Some people like the minigame as it is, and seeing it reduced to an afterthought like instant fire 1 would make it might be disappointing. It's not a problem for people who wouldn't mind, but for people who do it's not a suggestion they'd support.

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I did suggest it as an advancement "after you obtain Fire 4." For all I care it's an advancement at level 98 or has an extra long GCD, I'd just rather Fire 1 instead of Scathe, and have any use for Blizz1 really.

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Ok so in this world where we have an extra long Fire 1 GCD instacast, would BLM have an alternative spell that's not longer than the gcd to maintain their cpm?

I like everything as it is, but if I had to ask, some really good glamours in that new dungeon for 5.1

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

And as I raise and light my cigar off my thumb with an instant Fire 1 I reiterate: ... that's a problem how?

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Because some of us would rather not see the job go this direction.

Summoner already exists for those who want minimal punishment for less-than-ideal movement. About half the considerations I have to make as a Black Mage on more demanding encounters go out the window if F1 is just baseline instant cast.

Honestly I like everything exactly as it is. Maybe something cosmetic like different casting animations would be nice.

Gameplay wise, possibly a very slight increase in aoe radius might allow some different aoe optimizations on certain fights, but that's not a large concern.

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Originally Posted by SaberMaxwell

Some people like the minigame as it is, and seeing it reduced to an afterthought like instant fire 1 would make it might be disappointing. It's not a problem for people who wouldn't mind, but for people who do it's not a suggestion they'd support.

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Fair 'nuff, though for a lot of people like myself it means having Swift/Triplecast for things other than Fire 1.

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Ok so in this world where we have an extra long Fire 1 GCD instacast, would BLM have an alternative spell that's not longer than the gcd to maintain their cpm?

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They could always shave a couple tenths of a second off Fire 4. /shrug

But to be clear, the extended GCD wasn't a serious suggestion. Mostly.

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Originally Posted by Kabooa

Summoner already exists for those who want minimal punishment for less-than-ideal movement. About half the considerations I have to make as a Black Mage on more demanding encounters go out the window if F1 is just baseline instant cast.

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And yet, improving our mobility is still one of the biggest considerations for our advancements, particularly this expansion -- Umbral Soul, Xenoglossy, improved Sharpcast, and so on.

But agree to disagree on Fire 1. At the very least, an instant Blizz 1 would certainly be more interesting than Scathe, and give it a better place in the kit.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Fair 'nuff, though for a lot of people like myself it means having Swift/Triplecast for things other than Fire 1.



They could always shave a couple tenths of a second off Fire 4. /shrug

But to be clear, the extended GCD wasn't a serious suggestion. Mostly.



And yet, improving our mobility is still one of the biggest considerations for our advancements, particularly this expansion -- Umbral Soul, Xenoglossy, improved Sharpcast, and so on.

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And it's arguably a little bit too good as is.

For instance, I did not want Umbral Soul. It just reminded me of even more irritating Meditation spam (soon replaced with the even more similar Form Shift spam). Nor did I want Aspect Mastery; I'd have much preferred to simple take Umbral Ice ticks off the server tick, making them feel smooth and consistent -- rather than effectively axing the mechanic outright. Instead, the devs again chose to invalidate their own past mechanics rather than simply fixing them, which in turn made certain other skills even more deeply traps (Fire II, Blizzard I, Blizzard II) rather than, again, fixing them.

Personally, all I want to see, aside from the above Umbral Ice fix, is for stacks to work in a less awkward manner. Rather than having 25/50/75% MP cost reduction, 5/10/15% damage decrease, and 0/0/50% cast speed increase on element-crossover atop a 40/60/80% damage increase in AF, why not just have each go 20/40/60 -- 20% per stack? You could increase Ice spell potency to mirror the increased Fire spell potencies as you compensate for the lost 20% and you'd just generally smooth gameplay in a way that does not outright remove past nuances of play for any and all levels.

I kind of wish either that Despair had a 2.8s cast or even that F4/B4 had 3.0s casts so that optimal use of Triplecast was a little more flexible.

Aside from that, I want to see more fire/ice symmetry, especially with AoEs:

Fire2 and Blizzard2 are both targeted, 80 potency AoEs with 2.5s cast times and 800mp casting costs. A late-game trait makes them grant three stacks of their respective buff on hit, just like F3/B3, so B2 becomes the go-to way to recover stacks post-death or after some other loss while F3 shifts to fire mode during your AoE rotation.

Meanwhile, Freeze gets a 4.0s base cast time like Flare so spamming it isn’t attractive.

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Originally Posted by Ferrinus

Aside from that, I want to see more fire/ice symmetry, especially with AoEs:

Fire2 and Blizzard2 are both targeted, 80 potency AoEs with 2.5s cast times and 800mp casting costs. A late-game trait makes them grant three stacks of their respective buff on hit, just like F3/B3, so B2 becomes the go-to way to recover stacks post-death or after some other loss while F3 shifts to fire mode during your AoE rotation.

Meanwhile, Freeze gets a 4.0s base cast time like Flare so spamming it isn’t attractive.

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1. "Symmetry" is a strange concept in this context, considering their phases do two objectively different and diametrically opposed things, and these differences are what define their use. If having opposing spells that do the same thing is what you're after, might I suggest RDM instead?

2. Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 don't need to give 3-stacks each, and to be honest it wouldn't make them more attractive if they did. Not only do F3/B3/Flare/Freeze/Despair already provide it (so we would officially have more tools to instantly cap stacks than builders, after which they have no value beyond refreshing), but 80 potency for an AoE is pathetic, which Fire 2 only gets away with early on thanks to AF. Since you mentioned "late game traits" I have to assume you mean to provide a place for them post-50, even though there is presently no place for them in our AoE rotation, which is in a very comfortable spot right now without them.

3. Putting a spell with a lengthy cast in the UI phase means its value will plummet before you finish casting. Freeze being an AoE is largely a courtesy compared to capping UI and a UH stack, since the damage of ice phase pales to fire phase; you basically just want to hit UI3 and pump out as much quick damage as you can before your MP caps and you go back to AF (and once we get Flare, we don't even need to cap!). The only time Freeze spam is attractive is for the period during leveling before you get Flare, and that's mostly because -- again -- Fire 2 is terrible.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

And yet, improving our mobility is still one of the biggest considerations for our advancements, particularly this expansion -- Umbral Soul, Xenoglossy, improved Sharpcast, and so on.

But agree to disagree on Fire 1. At the very least, an instant Blizz 1 would certainly be more interesting than Scathe, and give it a better place in the kit.

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Umbral Soul isn't meant as tool for movement but unavoidable downtimes like E1 add spawn or E3 Maelstrom. It's meant to provide a tool to effectively make use of times without a target. It may be used as a last resort to prevent dropping Enochion in UI, though with how short UI phase is, this shouldn't be an issue. Triple, Swift, Xeno, Firestarter/ Thundercloud procs with Sharpcast available more often, Aetherial Manipulatio, Between the Lines and fast casts are enough mobility tools.
BLM has enough mobility tools to prevent dps drops from back-to-back mechanics but they are just limited enough so one of the main challenges of playing BLM remains minimizing movement by knowing the encounter and planning ahead accordingly. If you have to resort to Scathe, it's almost always because you messed something up and accidentally used a mobility tool too soon.

I think BLM is in a really good spot right now, not just because they rank so high but because their whole toolkit feels well-rounded and the challenges it comes with don't feel clunky. Instant Fire I would make life a tad too easy because even if someone planned poorly or not at all it will become almost impossible to ever let Enochion drop in AF and since Fire I still deals decent dps and procs Firestarter, poor planning would lead to relatively small dps loss.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

1. "Symmetry" is a strange concept in this context, considering their phases do two objectively different and diametrically opposed things, and these differences are what define their use. If having opposing spells that do the same thing is what you're after, might I suggest RDM instead?

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Fire 1 and Blizzard 1 have identical base potencies, cast times, and MP costs. Their differences come from stances and traits. The same is true of F3/B3 and F4/B4. So, it'd be elegant if Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 also had identical on-paper stats but were differently useful thanks to stances and traits.

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2. Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 don't need to give 3-stacks each, and to be honest it wouldn't make them more attractive if they did. Not only do F3/B3/Flare/Freeze/Despair already provide it (so we would officially have more tools to instantly cap stacks than builders, after which they have no value beyond refreshing), but 80 potency for an AoE is pathetic, which Fire 2 only gets away with early on thanks to AF. Since you mentioned "late game traits" I have to assume you mean to provide a place for them post-50, even though there is presently no place for them in our AoE rotation, which is in a very comfortable spot right now without them.

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You missed that I think they should have 2.5s cast times and 800mp costs - same as F1/B1. That means that before level 68 (when "Improved Umbral Heart" allows you to double flare each fire cycle) Fire 2 would be your generic AoE attack vs. 4 targets or more, (vs. 3 or more prior to 60). Between 60 and 68, you might still use F2 instead of F1 to refresh Astral between F4s if there were exactly three enemies.

Past 68, Flare definitively outpaces F2, so what's the use of F2? Well, that's when a trait makes F2 work like F3 when it comes to granting AF3 immediately - you'd use it instead of F3 to swap from UI to AF, so that you never had to cast a "cold flare". Others have suggested this above. Make sense?

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3. Putting a spell with a lengthy cast in the UI phase means its value will plummet before you finish casting. Freeze being an AoE is largely a courtesy compared to capping UI and a UH stack, since the damage of ice phase pales to fire phase; you basically just want to hit UI3 and pump out as much quick damage as you can before your MP caps and you go back to AF (and once we get Flare, we don't even need to cap!). The only time Freeze spam is attractive is for the period during leveling before you get Flare, and that's mostly because -- again -- Fire 2 is terrible.

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Remember, AF3 halves ice spell cast times. So, you'd still use Freeze after Flare to swap to UI. However, you wouldn't be Freeze for AoE damage between levels 35 and 50 or whatever it is, and you also wouldn't use Freeze to instantly get to UI3 after death or other mishap, instead favoring B2. The idea is to give every single spell some kind of logical use case at every level you have it for.

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Originally Posted by Rilifane

I think BLM is in a really good spot right now, not just because they rank so high but because their whole toolkit feels well-rounded and the challenges it comes with don't feel clunky.

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Sure, as soon as you get up to level 72... Until then? There's been absolutely no effort to fix old idiosyncrasies that take performance out of the hand of the player and solely into the mercy of, say, the server tick. Those issues may be minor, but it's still annoying to see the entire mechanic of MP margins removed just to avoid actually fixing the issue (which has been there, unmitigateably since they removed mana-shadowing, and remains up until ShB levels).

Meanwhile, Fire II? Useless. Blizzard I and II? Useless. Blizzard IV in AoE? Useless. I'd be okay with situational usefulness, but outright traps?

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Originally Posted by Rilifane

Umbral Soul isn't meant as tool for movement but unavoidable downtimes like E1 add spawn or E3 Maelstrom. It's meant to provide a tool to effectively make use of times without a target. It may be used as a last resort to prevent dropping Enochion in UI, though with how short UI phase is, this shouldn't be an issue. Triple, Swift, Xeno, Firestarter/ Thundercloud procs with Sharpcast available more often, Aetherial Manipulatio, Between the Lines and fast casts are enough mobility tools.

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I understand that it's not meant to be a skill for movement phases of encounters. What I'm saying though is that it still contributes to the job's general mobility, largely due to the quite literal ability to maintain Enochian while moving between packs in dungeons but especially since you can re-enter an encounter having skipped past B3/B4 and jump straight to Thunder (ideally off a TC proc) and accelerated F3.

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If you have to resort to Scathe, it's almost always because you messed something up and accidentally used a mobility tool too soon.

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Which is exactly what I was referring to with regards to my statement that aside from timing out an AF refresh a second sooner, you'd largely just use an instant F1 like Scathe -- a competent BLM would have skipped past using Scathe by means of several other tools to allow them to continue their normal rotation whilst moving.
But again, I already said agree to disagree.

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Originally Posted by Ferrinus

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I'm not against Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 getting buffs during the leveling phase -- by all means go ahead.
My concern is that you're trying to draw out their lifespan beyond that point to a largely unnecessary degree.

Just for a moment I invite you to consider, that when all is said and done with your plan:
1) Blizzard 2 is still equally forgotten after we get Freeze. We only need one transition tool and Freeze already covers that, and we ideally won't spend enough time in UI to spam anything anyway.
2) Best case scenario, all you've accomplished for Fire 2 by endgame is having it replace Fire 3 as a transition tool in AoE scenarios, since we still wouldn't spam it after getting Flare.
3) You've introduced a penalty to Freeze -- a skill we use in end-game -- in order to advance another skill that will still largely get phased out during the leveling process, just slower. Congrats?

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Blizzard IV in AoE? Useless. I'd be okay with situational usefulness, but outright traps?

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Shurri, you know I love you, but "not having a use for a single-target skill in AoE" is a weird hill to die on for a job that literally has different DoT skills for single- and multi-target.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Just for a moment I invite you to consider, that when all is said and done with your plan:
1) Blizzard 2 is still equally forgotten after we get Freeze. We only need one transition tool and Freeze already covers that, and we ideally won't spend enough time in UI to spam anything anyway.
2) Best case scenario, all you've accomplished for Fire 2 by endgame is having it replace Fire 3 as a transition tool in AoE scenarios, since we still wouldn't spam it after getting Flare.
3) You've introduced a penalty to Freeze -- a skill we use in end-game -- in order to advance another skill that will still largely get phased out during the leveling process, just slower. Congrats?

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The problem is, you can't really have B2 become Freeze and F2 become Flare because the former's a strict upgrade while the latter isn't - F2 doesn't cost all your mana and take 4 seconds to cast. Also, that leaves the quirk in our AoE rotation where using F3 to swap to astral on 5+ targets is actually a dps loss. So, I think giving F2 F3-like functionality actually works really well - it lets you swap while maximizing the damage of both your cycle's flares and works as more conventional spammable AoE in earlier levels.
B2 ends up much more marginal (as does B1, which is like... a way to keep UI going if you have a single GCD left and want to add a teeny bit more damage? This is where making F1 and B1 both instant casts and getting rid of Scathe all together really appeals) but I'd prefer that to it vanishing all together.

If it was feasible, I'd love for Freeze to also do 260 potency to one target and 40% less to the rest, except it would end up replacing B3!

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Originally Posted by Shurrikhan

Sure, as soon as you get up to level 72... Until then? There's been absolutely no effort to fix old idiosyncrasies that take performance out of the hand of the player and solely into the mercy of, say, the server tick. Those issues may be minor, but it's still annoying to see the entire mechanic of MP margins removed just to avoid actually fixing the issue (which has been there, unmitigateably since they removed mana-shadowing, and remains up until ShB levels).

Meanwhile, Fire II? Useless. Blizzard I and II? Useless. Blizzard IV in AoE? Useless. I'd be okay with situational usefulness, but outright traps?

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I'm mainly talking about max level here as all classes have skills that become less useful if not downright obsolete. Escpecially classes that has been around since ARR and underwent frequent changes. Personally I don't think it's that big of an issue. The roation evolves and changes and some skills fall behind and only remain useful when hitting low level content in roulettes. Skills gradually expand and the gameplay changes with it.
Cure I and Medica I are basically useless once you get past a certain level and Cure III is only very rarely used during stack up mechanics in ex/ savage and even then it's preferred to exhaust other options first. Skills lose their value over time and are mainly kept for low level content. And below a certain level, Blizzard I has it's use, same with Fire II.
Blizzard II needs to be targeted just like Fire II so you can properly use it. But why would Blizzard IV need to be useful in AoE rotation? It's a ST filler, period.

Server ticks cause problems for a number of classes and that so much is tied to them while at the same time being unpredictable is a nuisance, that much is true.
I much prefer systems like in WoW where hots/ dots always tick in set intervalls, depending on haste, after you applied them.
The tiny second you sometimes have to wait after getting back into UI to continue happily flaring away is awkward and disruptive and at max level, escpecially at higher spell speed tiers, server ticks can cause problems like not getting the 2nd tick within 2 GCDs and having to resort to a 3rd cast in UI to get back to 10k.
Nonetheless BLM is in a really good spot, escpecially at max level.

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Originally Posted by Ferrinus

The problem is, you can't really have B2 become Freeze and F2 become Flare because the former's a strict upgrade while the latter isn't - F2 doesn't cost all your mana and take 4 seconds to cast.

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That hardly matters if it's still an upgrade to PPS and overall PPM. You might have had a point if there was ever a time where you would have both and use both -- spamming F2 in AoE and ending in Flare for instance -- but as it stands Fire 2 is completely phased out before you even get Flare, so the effective upgrade is still viable.

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Also, that leaves the quirk in our AoE rotation where using F3 to swap to astral on 5+ targets is actually a dps loss.

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Define "actually a DPS loss", since a loss means there is something to compare to. Compared to just spamming Freeze and never getting Flare out? Compared to hitting Transpose and rebuilding before Flare?
Are we saying hitting Flare in ice phase and getting one more Flare in AF is more PPM than a quick Fire 3 and two Flares in AF thanks to IUH? Because if that's the case -- and ignoring that Transpose is still presently an option -- my suggestion to have Flare interact with Aspect Mastery to not consume IUH is still available, considering that that seems like an oversight that they don't already.

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B2 ends up much more marginal (as does B1, which is like... a way to keep UI going if you have a single GCD left and want to add a teeny bit more damage? This is where making F1 and B1 both instant casts and getting rid of Scathe all together really appeals) but I'd prefer that to it vanishing all together.

If it was feasible, I'd love for Freeze to also do 260 potency to one target and 40% less to the rest, except it would end up replacing B3!

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One other thing I failed to point out as a flaw with your design: We don't just go straight into using half-cast Freezes to transition until we get Aspect Mastery. Before that point we have to Transpose after Flare, which goes back to "you just gave Freeze a 4-second cast time in UI phase".

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Originally Posted by Rilifane

I'm mainly talking about max level here as all classes have skills that become less useful if not downright obsolete.

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Name one other skill that becomes rotationally worthless without being outright upgraded (e.g. Straight Shot) or complemented (e.g. Kaiten as used on combo finishers)?

No one else just leaves rotational items there, in a far worse relative place than at level 50, as joke traps for players.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

One other thing I failed to point out as a flaw with your design: We don't just go straight into using half-cast Freezes to transition until we get Aspect Mastery. Before that point we have to Transpose after Flare, which goes back to "you just gave Freeze a 4-second cast time in UI phase".

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Also, this. Could we please stop designing solely around max level to the detriment of the leveling experience?

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

That hardly matters if it's still an upgrade to PPS and overall PPM. You might have had a point if there was ever a time where you would have both and use both -- spamming F2 in AoE and ending in Flare for instance -- but as it stands Fire 2 is completely phased out before you even get Flare, so the effective upgrade is still viable.

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But, it wouldn't be if its cast time and MP cost were reduced to F1's. In that case, F2 would be useful for AoE before level 68.

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Define "actually a DPS loss", since a loss means there is something to compare to. Compared to just spamming Freeze and never getting Flare out? Compared to hitting Transpose and rebuilding before Flare?

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Compared to using Flare to swap from Umbral to Astral. You know, the "cold flare" AoE rotation that's technically superior to using F3 when you've got 5+ targets? If F2 could work as, effectively, an AoE F3, it would have a place at level 68+.

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One other thing I failed to point out as a flaw with your design: We don't just go straight into using half-cast Freezes to transition until we get Aspect Mastery. Before that point we have to Transpose after Flare, which goes back to "you just gave Freeze a 4-second cast time in UI phase".

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You'd be able to use it to transition to Umbral from Astral after AoEing a bunch of targets from levels 35 to 49, or after doing a Flare -> Convert ->F2 between levels 50 and 67. I could see going farther and giving Freeze, specifically, a 0 base MP cost or something as a mirror to Flare's "all" MP cost, but even if nothing of the sort happens Freeze falling out of use for 17 levels is acceptable given that it still ends up with a place at level 68 and higher.

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Originally Posted by Ferrinus

But, it wouldn't be if its cast time and MP cost were reduced to F1's. In that case, F2 would be useful for AoE before level 68.

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Have you crunched the numbers on that or are you just crossing your fingers?

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Compared to using Flare to swap from Umbral to Astral. You know, the "cold flare" AoE rotation that's technically superior to using F3 when you've got 5+ targets? If F2 could work as, effectively, an AoE F3, it would have a place at level 68+.

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So you want to hamfist in an ability that's dead to the community for a technicality, in lieu of an option like, say, just patching Flare to actually be affected by Aspect Mastery so you still have Umbral Hearts after a Cold Flare (which I think we can agree is a massive oversight that it doesn't already)?

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You'd be able to use it to transition to Umbral from Astral after AoEing a bunch of targets from levels 35 to 49, or after doing a Flare -> Convert ->F2 between levels 50 and 67. I could see going farther and giving Freeze, specifically, a 0 base MP cost or something as a mirror to Flare's "all" MP cost, but even if nothing of the sort happens Freeze falling out of use for 17 levels is acceptable given that it still ends up with a place at level 68 and higher.

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Are you aware of the difference that that 17 levels makes? That's all of the post-ARR content, the entirety of Heavensward and most of Stormblood, for a first-time leveler that's nearly a month and even for someone with Armory bonus that could be weeks. Compare that to the gap from 35 to 50, which is like... A day? Three tops?
Not to mention how incredibly disjointed it is to get a spell you use for 14 levels, ignore for 17 and then recover for 12 more.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

So you want to hamfist in an ability that's dead to the community for a technicality, in lieu of an option like, say, just patching Flare to actually be affected by Aspect Mastery so you still have Umbral Hearts after a Cold Flare (which I think we can agree is a massive oversight that it doesn't already)?

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Neither option should come in lieu of the other. There's no point in adding and then leaving a skill that has zero place past level 56. Though, neither do I like that a seemingly obvious use of the another skill is exempt on a technicality. Both are awful.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Are you aware of the difference that that 17 levels makes? That's all of the post-ARR content, the entirety of Heavensward and most of Stormblood, for a first-time leveler that's nearly a month and even for someone with Armory bonus that could be weeks. Compare that to the gap from 35 to 50, which is like... A day? Three tops?
Not to mention how incredibly disjointed it is to get a spell you use for 14 levels, ignore for 17 and then recover for 12 more.

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I'd rather avoid both gaps, but, yes, I'd certainly take 15 quickly-progressed levels over 17 of the slowest, especially if taking, leaving, and then again taking it.

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Originally Posted by Archwizard

Have you crunched the numbers on that or are you just crossing your fingers?

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180 potency on 1 target versus 80 potency on multiple targets. Better than F1 on 3 and better than F4 on 4. Most jobs do this kind of math when choosing single target vs. multitarget abilities on non-massive pulls.

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So you want to hamfist in an ability that's dead to the community for a technicality, in lieu of an option like, say, just patching Flare to actually be affected by Aspect Mastery so you still have Umbral Hearts after a Cold Flare (which I think we can agree is a massive oversight that it doesn't already)?

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Nothing hamfisted about it. There's an obvious gap in the fire spellset (an AoE that swaps you to AF3 with your mana pool intact) and a longstanding AoE fire spell that falls out of use long before level 80. It's a match made in heaven! The B2/Freeze stuff is a bit questionable but making F2 effectively an area of effect F3 is a slam dunk.

I don't agree that flare consuming umbral hearts when cast out of ice mode is an oversight. If Fire 2 simply didn't exist at all, I could see using Flare as the swap-to-AF spell as well as your heavy-hitting AF AoE, but given that F2 needs a home there's no reason to change Flare's behavior in that way.

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Are you aware of the difference that that 17 levels makes? That's all of the post-ARR content, the entirety of Heavensward and most of Stormblood, for a first-time leveler that's nearly a month and even for someone with Armory bonus that could be weeks. Compare that to the gap from 35 to 50, which is like... A day? Three tops?
Not to mention how incredibly disjointed it is to get a spell you use for 14 levels, ignore for 17 and then recover for 12 more.

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Making sure every spell is useful at level 80 is more important to me than making sure every spell is useful for every level in the entire progression, but like I said, you could just make Freeze cost 0mp by default, regardless of aspect, (Flare costs All, so Freeze costs None, see?) and fix even this issue.

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Originally Posted by Ferrinus

180 potency on 1 target versus 80 potency on multiple targets. Better than F1 on 3 and better than F4 on 4. Most jobs do this kind of math when choosing single target vs. multitarget abilities on non-massive pulls.

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That's the vacuum of the one spell against single-target spells. How about comparing its impact to just using Flare during AF3, in the context of the AoE rotation as a whole?
It's the same way we came out with the numbers that Freeze spam was more potent than a mixed rotation with F2, comparing their rotations' average potency-per-second rather than each spell's potency-per-cast.
So show me the numbers on this ideal rotation and compare them to what we have before you tell me it's better, because your changes amount to more F2s (not stronger, just more) and the last time that math was done, more F2s brought that average down.

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Nothing hamfisted about it. There's an obvious gap in the fire spellset (an AoE that swaps you to AF3 with your mana pool intact) and a longstanding AoE fire spell that falls out of use long before level 80. It's a match made in heaven!
The B2/Freeze stuff is a bit questionable but making F2 effectively an area of effect F3 is a slam dunk.

I don't agree that flare consuming umbral hearts when cast out of ice mode is an oversight. If Fire 2 simply didn't exist at all, I could see using Flare as the swap-to-AF spell as well as your heavy-hitting AF AoE, but given that F2 needs a home there's no reason to change Flare's behavior in that way.

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• There's already an AoE that gives you AF3. Aspect Mastery reads without ambiguity, and I quote, "Accumulating full stacks of either Astral Fire or Umbral Ice then casting a spell of the opposite element will consume no MP" -- yet Flare is the one unmentioned exception to this, whether or not you have Umbral Hearts. You want a match made in heaven, fix that interaction and marry those two, because you're going to have a very hard time convincing me that the new trait is meant to ignore it in the same expansion that specifically changed Freeze to make Flare usage smoother.
• "If Fire 2 simply didn't exist at all" is quite amusing justification in this case, considering you're attempting to retool it into a completely different ability -- Fire 2 as you wish it to be doesn't exist. You're tuning more than just the potency, but the overall cast rate and its impact on the rotation, creating a new tool with an old name, used in a completely different way from its namesake.
  Even the existence of what we have (as with Blizzard 2) has been considered an "oversight" from level 50 on. But again, this is literally why I stated that they should simply upgrade to Flare and Freeze, as your behavior with regards to AoE is rather permanently affected either way.
• I find it quite curious that you advocate creating more parallels in the positions of our Fire and Ice spells, yet also want Fire 2 to carve out a spot as the parallel to Freeze for the purpose of swapping phases in AoE. You also haven't really covered how you intend to rescue its actual counterpart B2 from its status as a bloat skill.
  Because, and I can't seem to stress this enough, that's what Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 are: bloat skills. Ones you're attempting to justify as more than that for niche purposes, but bloat all the same.

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Making sure every spell is useful at level 80 is more important to me than making sure every spell is useful for every level in the entire progression

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And what was your justification for nerfing the cast time of Freeze in the first place, again? "Making Freeze spam less attractive than Fire 2" wasn't it, which is only a problem while leveling?

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but like I said, you could just make Freeze cost 0mp by default, regardless of aspect, (Flare costs All, so Freeze costs None, see?) and fix even this issue.

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Then we end up with the humorous possibility of Flare returning to its original form, meaning saving Swiftcast for Flare in single-target to burn out the last of our MP as a prototype of Despair -- before we even have Aspect Mastery -- and then using Freeze in place of Blizzard 3. If the numbers happen to support that possibility now then it'll cascade to Flare and Freeze being nerfed in prevention.

I don't get why we don't just solidify the fundamental aspects of the job.

1. Give each stack 20% off cast times and mana cost of the opposite element while increasing Fire damage by 20% per AF stack and UI tick strength by 20% per UI stack. (Adjust initial UI strength to compensate, or even just increase the base MP rate uniquely for BLMs, and just have UI affect that.)
2. UI ticks follow their own timer, which continues progressing through AF (just locked out of actually finishing the tick), so your first tick is always instant, meaning you're never completely locked out of any and all actions. Swapping to UI3 will already grant access to any action from the initial tick alone, while UI1 will at least grant access immediately to all Ice spells. No need for Aspect Mastery; the issue's already solved at level 1.
3. Give each Fire and Blizzard spell the same potencies as their counterpart (this really just means increasing the Fire potencies to compensate for going from 40/60/80 to 20/40/60 and then buffing the Ice spells to match). Blizzard II is now target-based alike to Fire II. Simple, intuitive.
4. Don't exempt Flare from the stack bonuses. Flare would normally cost all of your MP. Now, Flare will cost 40% of your maximum MP (100%-60%=40%). Freeze continues to shift you to UI3, alike to Flare. Voila, you have an AoE 3-stack-shift for either one as of level 50. Again, simple, intuitive.

It's... not hard.