BLM's Blizzard 4 needs a potency buff

For a while now, there has been a blm rotation going around that skips blizzard 4 and fire 1, opting to do 4 fire 4's and a despair rather than 6 fire 4's and a despair. This is apparently slightly stronger and is clearly an unintended rotation.

By blm rule of thumb, casting fire 1 is worth it if you can get another fire 4 and can still use despair. Then, the suggested proposal is to bring blizzard 4's potency per second in line with fire 1's.

Fire 1 has 324 potency under astral fire 3 and a cast time of 2.5s. This is a pps of 129.6.

Blizzard 4 has a cast time of 2.8s. Multiplying that with the above pps gives us 362.88 potency. For a round number and to make the intended rotation indeed the optimal one, we'll raise that to 370 potency. Note, blizzard 4's current potency is 300.

Thus, I propose a 70 potency buff to blizzard 4 from 300 to 370 so that the developers' intended rotation is appropriately effective. In the long run, this is around a 0.8% increase to blm's dps which is significant but not so significant as to be game-breaking.

Why exactly is this needed? Blizzard 4 isn't meant to be "spammed" , its just used to get Umbral Hearts and that's it. But if you already have the hearts, you can skip Blizzard 4 entirely. What benefit does increasing the potency have?

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Originally Posted by Fang0r

irrational buffs to blm

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No. BLM is already top dps by a nice margin. Next.

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Originally Posted by Eloah

Why exactly is this needed? Blizzard 4 isn't meant to be "spammed" , its just used to get Umbral Hearts and that's it. But if you already have the hearts, you can skip Blizzard 4 entirely. What benefit does increasing the potency have?

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OP is not suggesting it should be spammable. OP is referring to this:
https://i.imgur.com/VIF10yG.png

The intended use of Blizzard IV is to generate three Umbral Hearts in order to buy a Fire and two more Fire IVs. However, these three extra fire spells do not make up for the time spent casting Blizzard IV in the first place. OP suggests an increase to Blizzard IV potency in order to make it worth casting as is intended.

OP's math is slightly off, though. In order for Blizzard IV to be worth using at all, the rotation that uses Blizzard IV would have to deal an additional 90 potency, more than the OP suggests.
https://i.imgur.com/J2djx05.png

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Originally Posted by Caduagm

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Originally Posted by Fang0r

irrational buffs to blm

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No. BLM is already top dps by a nice margin. Next.

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Snarky. The maths are easily reasoned. See above. As for its effect on BLM's maximal damage output, such an increase in potency would have a negligible effect--it would increase the P/s of the intended BLM rotation to just 0.0083 P/s over the short rotation, which is a gain of 1,000~1850 potency per fight (1.5% increase to DPS) for someone who is currently using the intended rotation, but only a gain of 3~5 potency per fight (a 0.0000476% increase to DPS) for someone who is currently using the short rotation.

Speaking personally, I think every job could use this sort of approach where a less-flexible/higher demand variant leads to higher performance, with the guideline rotation being "Good enough".

Using this specific example - The "Good enough" 3/1/3 we have as standard and the 4/1, which if I remember right from reading into this a couple months ago, was a more high risk approach where any gains were easily lost.

This may have changed since then, as I was primarily interested in it due to speculation we made in black mage threads before the expansion released about the possibility of a F1-less rotation, and not to actually do it.

On the other hand, having multiple, equal powered variant rotations goes to the "right tool, right job" angle of design, and that's not bad either so.

I guess I don't think it's necessary, but wouldn't say no to it?

Per rongway's maths, it might seem like a potency increase would still retain that flexibility, with such a negligible difference between the rotations. Which might even be more in line with the idea of having those variants, by trying to match up potencies as closely as possible. Kinda sounds like an exciting idea, to effectively have 2 rotations available.

Ice mage, go

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Originally Posted by Rongway

OP is not suggesting it should be spammable. OP is referring to this:
https://i.imgur.com/VIF10yG.png

The intended use of Blizzard IV is to generate three Umbral Hearts in order to buy a Fire and two more Fire IVs. However, these three extra fire spells do not make up for the time spent casting Blizzard IV in the first place. OP suggests an increase to Blizzard IV potency in order to make it worth casting as is intended.

OP's math is slightly off, though. In order for Blizzard IV to be worth using at all, the rotation that uses Blizzard IV would have to deal an additional 90 potency, more than the OP suggests.
https://i.imgur.com/J2djx05.png




Snarky. The maths are easily reasoned. See above. As for its effect on BLM's maximal damage output, such an increase in potency would have a negligible effect--it would increase the P/s of the intended BLM rotation to just 0.0083 P/s over the short rotation, which is a gain of 1,000~1850 potency per fight (1.5% increase to DPS) for someone who is currently using the intended rotation, but only a gain of 3~5 potency per fight (a 0.0000476% increase to DPS) for someone who is currently using the short rotation.

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I'm a "false beginner" BLM ; I'm confused in the second rotation as to what spells to use during ice phase to be sure you had the 2 mana ticks then ? When Xeno isn't active I mean, and if you casted thunder III again at that time wouldn't it be clipping the DOT quite largely ?

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Originally Posted by Karshan

I'm a "false beginner" BLM ; I'm confused in the second rotation as to what spells to use during ice phase to be sure you had the 2 mana ticks then ? When Xeno isn't active I mean, and if you casted thunder III again at that time wouldn't it be clipping the DOT quite largely ?

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You have 1s after Blizzard III, 2.5s casting Thunder, and 1.5s casting Fire III, so short of 5s total when accounting for spell speed. You need t>3.0s and t≤6.0s to get a second tick, so there's an okay probability that you'll get the two ticks. However, in the event that you only get the one tick, it's still just barely a potency gain over the intended rotation if you do an ultrashort rotation for that one time only.

https://i.imgur.com/Fxoqdm6.png

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Originally Posted by Rongway

You have 1s after Blizzard III, 2.5s casting Thunder, and 1.5s casting Fire III, so short of 5s total when accounting for spell speed. You need t>3.0s and t≤6.0s to get a second tick, so there's an okay probability that you'll get the two ticks. However, in the event that you only get the one tick, it's still just barely a potency gain over the intended rotation if you do an ultrashort rotation for that one time only.

https://i.imgur.com/Fxoqdm6.png

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In that case, Blizzard IV would only be short about 40p, and OP's suggestion of 70p might be better than my suggestion of 90p after all, to account for the short rotation not being able to guarantee 4x FireIV on every rotation.

I seem to remember there was a period in Stormblood where people tried to calculate whether Blizz 4 could be removed from rotation, but it turned out that it was a DPS loss to do so despite on paper seeming like potentially a good idea.

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Originally Posted by Caduagm

No. BLM is already top dps by a nice margin. Next.

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If you were paying attention, you'd realise this isn't a buff at all.
It's simply binging the B4 rotation up to the same dps as the no-B4 rotation, so that there's no reason to use the no-B4 rotation.

Playing around with that rotation, it's a lot tighter in terms of timing and reminds me of when Enochian was first a thing due to how close it cuts to Enochian being dropped. I did get slightly better results on a striking dummy, but I'm pretty sure I would lose dps during a real fight because of how tight the windows are to refresh Enochian and get the regen ticks in before Fire 3. Having Swiftcast, Enochian on a 30 cd, and Xenoglossy help out with giving space in these windows but I personally prefer the security of the standard rotation. I don't think this necessarily needs to be nerfed so to speak, but maybe just taken into consideration with future patches so that it doesn't become the de facto rotation.

But, BLM is top DPS?

This thread misses the point of Blizzard 4. You have to typically wait for 2 ticks of mp gain to get full mp, which you obviously want.
Blizzard 4 was created in order to satisfy that. In fact, many times you need a little under 3 GCDs if you're unlucky with server ticks, which is also one of the factors of why people use thunder during ice phase.
You don't use blizzard 4 for it's sweet damage or anything like that. In fact, I'd bet if blizzard three just gave you a full mp bar upon casting, you wouldn't even want the umbral hearts.

Blizzard 4 is there because BLM needs another skill to use during ice phase to fulfill server ticks. The dev team saw this, and gave them a low damage utility spell in that slot.
If you already have a full MP bar, like say, in your opener, it's not necessary to fluff up your blizzard phase with another cast.
Blizzard 4's "issue" as described by people here is literally that it fulfills it's role of a utility spell to cast while waiting for your MP to come back extremely well.

It's wonderful at the moment. It needs absolutely no change whatsoever.

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Originally Posted by Plushy

Uhh...I don't think we need any buffs.
We're already the top dps.
Though ofc I wouldn't say no but kinda don't wanna be that op to the point everybody is playing blm.

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Originally Posted by Renkei

But, BLM is top DPS?

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Guys. Read the post. This isn't about a meaningful increase to DPS. As it stands, casting Blizzard 4 assuming that you're already full mana isn't worth it (and it looks like it might not worth it if you are below full mana either). It's better to just get out the 4 Fire IVs and a Despair instead of 6 Fire IVs that Blizzard IV allows for with a Fire I in between.

They're not asking for "more DPS" just for the sake of more DPS, they're asking for a potency increase on Blizzard 4 so that casting Blizzard IV is ALWAYS worth it. As it stands, Blizzard IV isn't worth the cast, but increasing the potency would actually make it worth it and make the BLM's intended rotation the ideal rotation.

tl;dr:

The Blizzard III / Thunder III / Blizzard IV / Fire III / 3 Fire IV / 1 Fire I / 3 Fire IV / Despair rotation isn't as good as
Blizzard III / Thunder III / Fire III / 4 Fire IV/ Despair

Increasing potency on Blizzard IV bridge the gap between those 2 rotations with a minimal DPS increase.

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Originally Posted by Flatopia

This thread misses the point of Blizzard 4. You have to typically wait for 2 ticks of mp gain to get full mp, which you obviously want.
Blizzard 4 was created in order to satisfy that. In fact, many times you need a little under 3 GCDs if you're unlucky with server ticks, which is also one of the factors of why people use thunder during ice phase.
You don't use blizzard 4 for it's sweet damage or anything like that. In fact, I'd bet if blizzard three just gave you a full mp bar upon casting, you wouldn't even want the umbral hearts.

Blizzard 4 is there because BLM needs another skill to use during ice phase to fulfill server ticks. The dev team saw this, and gave them a low damage utility spell in that slot.
If you already have a full MP bar, like say, in your opener, it's not necessary to fluff up your blizzard phase with another cast.
Blizzard 4's "issue" as described by people here is literally that it fulfills it's role of a utility spell to cast while waiting for your MP to come back extremely well.

It's wonderful at the moment. It needs absolutely no change whatsoever.

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This is a good point, but according to Rongway's math, it looks like the short rotation is still better than casting Blizzard IV in the scenario you described where you need another GCD to hit that second tick. I would wager a guess that given the cast time and GCD of Blizzard IV, it would likely be better to just wait a little longer before starting the Fire III cast than it would casting Blizzard IV beforehand.

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Originally Posted by LeonKeyh

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Originally Posted by Flatopia

This thread misses the point of Blizzard 4.

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Blizzard 4 is there because BLM needs another skill to use during ice phase to fulfill server ticks. The dev team saw this, and gave them a low damage utility spell in that slot.

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This is a good point, but according to Rongway's math, it looks like the short rotation is still better than casting Blizzard IV in the scenario you described where you need another GCD to hit that second tick. I would wager a guess that given the cast time and GCD of Blizzard IV, it would likely be better to just wait a little longer before starting the Fire III cast than it would casting Blizzard IV beforehand.

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Just to be clear, Fire III > 3x Fire IV > Despair is far worse than a Blizzard IV rotation. However, a macrorotation with fire phases consisting of 4x, 4x, and 3x Fire IVs still comes out ahead of always casting Blizzard IV.

The best practice would probably be to use Blizzard IV and 6 Fire IVs on the rotations where you don't have Polyglot (roughly every third rotation). In this case, you need to make sure you use Fire and get the extra Fire IVs; Blizzard IV with only 4x Fire IVs is worse than skipping Blizzard IV and only getting 3x Fire IVs.

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Originally Posted by Rongway

Just to be clear, Fire III > 3x Fire IV > Despair is far worse than a Blizzard IV rotation. However, a macrorotation with fire phases consisting of 4x, 4x, and 3x Fire IVs still comes out ahead of always casting Blizzard IV.

The best practice would probably be to use Blizzard IV and 6 Fire IVs on the rotations where you don't have Polyglot (roughly every third rotation). In this case, you need to make sure you use Fire and get the extra Fire IVs; Blizzard IV with only 4x Fire IVs is worse than skipping Blizzard IV and only getting 3x Fire IVs.

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Got it, so if you're aware enough, making sure to cast Blizzard IV whenever missing a tick is better, but if you're not paying attention to the ticks and just casting a strict rotation then the short rotation ends up correcting itself due to tick timing and the difference between rotation DPS every 3 cycles (i.e. the DPS loss on a 3x Fire IV phase doesn't fully negate the gain from the previous/next 2 4xFire IV phases). I figured that was how it ended up working out, but didn't know the full math. Thanks for the clarification.

Well, I see at on the TGS livestream right now.
Even Yoshi-P is sometimes skipping B4 when he has lucky serverticks.