BLM Buffs Inc!

[Grandpere]

Change to blm in my opinion will need to be a boost to our single stationnary dps (dummy target style) without AoE dps get any benefit from it. If they give something, i expect them to take back some other thing to balance everything. So I'm not so much excited with this annoncement.

What i would like:
- No gcd on Firestarter/thundercloud proc
- Cost of fire 1 spell reduced
- Boost time before Astral fire/Umbral ice buff fall down
- Not blm specific but would be nice; Finish your cast when target move behind you... on Keyboard and mouse its not so bad, but with controler (legacy mode) this is terrible!

Our dps is not THAT far behind so dont expect crazy stuff. This is clear that if SE give us stack of Firestarter for exemple, they will take it back a couple weeks after they see what ppl are able to achieve with that.

[Themis]

1) Firestarter should stack to 3.

If it wasn't for the randomness of getting a proc in the first place, this could be a thing that would be useful.

I don't typically end up wasting more than 1 Firestarter proc, so I don't know if I'd ever end up with 3. And you can't reliably build up and stock 3 Firestarters due to the random chance of it happening - I've gone a whole Fire cycle, several times, and not had a single proc.

Surecast should allow for certain spells to be cast while on the move for a short duration.

The problem with this is that we already have an ability that lets us do this - Swiftcast. That's exactly what that ability is designed to let you do. All this would be is a 2nd, albeit weaker due to having to go through cast time, version of Swiftcast and I don't see that happening.

Also, Surecast is far from useless in any part of the game. It let's you take a hit that would normally cancel your spell, without actually doing so. I've used it to finish of a mob (or mobs), and also to cast a Sleep whilst I sort myself out. It's a tool that has a place. Just because it isn't use in every facet of endgame doesn't mean it is useless.

Perhaps what is really needed, is more situations where Surecast has a bigger need/use. Or to be redesigned a new ability made in its place. What it doesn't need to be, is a 2nd Swiftcast (i.e. let you move whilst casting).

Finish your cast when target move behind you

This would be a nice thing that Surecast would let you do. It's not a very "sure cast" if it doesn't cast because of Line of Sight issues.

[saden]

The issue with this class is that it's inconsistent. It can be completely RNG as to what your DPS is and that's outside of crit-hit rate. Classes like Monk or Summoner can have consistently high DPS [depending on the mechanics of the fight] while BLM has to count on fire-starter and thunder-cloud procs for a larger percent of their DPS than should be RNG or luck based.

Not to mention those procs are on GCD. Also, they don't stack.

Honestly, I'm not sure letting them stack or taking them off GCD is going to fix much. I can go a whole minute where I get 5-6 fire-starters and a few thunderclouds, but the next minute I have nothing. I've gone the whole of turn 6 and gotten very few procs at all and then sometimes I get tons of them (and these are the attempts that go smoothly). I'd rather be consistent if anything...

[Kenji1134]

Well the "easy" way to address the RNG-ness of BLM is again... stacking mechanics.

Instead of a 40% chance and a 5% chance, have 2 internal stack counters, one for Firestarter and one for Thundercloud.

So every time you "successfully" cast Fire... meaning the cast goes off, doesnt have to land... Your FS Counter goes up by 1.
When your FS counter hits 2, you immediately get an FS proc... Yes this means we would "buff" FS to a 50% chance, sue me.

Similarly for TC, every time ANY mob takes damage from your Thunder dot, not the initial potency part, just the dot, you get a TC counter.
When the TC counter reaches 20, you get a TC proc.

There, no more RNG, very slight buff to dps.

Edit:
IDK, maybe its just me, but I wonder how things would go if SE tried moving away from RNG based design.
Would it be "bad" if we knew when procs would occur? We would end up treating them like dots...
A BLM rotation would be something like... *Start* B3-T2-F3-F1x2-(F3)-F1x2-(F3)-F1-|-B3-T2-F3-F1-(F3)-F1x2-(F3)-F1x2-(F3)-(TC)| *Back to Start*
...
Would that really be something bad? Now let us have 2 actual "stacks" of Firestarter, with the knowledge that IF we cast 4 Fires, we WILL have 2 Firestarter procs, and that will really help BLM's mobility issues.
We wont have Bard mobility, BUT we can control our stacks for movement, for concentrated bursting, or we can just fire them off as they become available.

Edit Again:
To parrot what Grandpere said, can we get Fire 1's cost reduced a little? Um.... I wanna say, without knowing the exact numbers, it would be nice if the cost of Fire 1 under AF3 as reduced by 22... So bring down the base MP cost at 50 to 308.
This should, I believe, allow someone to do the "current" 251 PIE rotation with 239 PIE, which is the lowest any lvl 50 BLM will have.

[Tempting]

Problem with these stack mechanics of "buffs" for BLM is that is helps ZERO for PvP also.

BLM are easily the worst DPS by a long shot in pvp because we instant die and when we cast its usually Sleep and running away casting Scathe and we all know Scathe dps is terrible since its a instant cast and intended to be.

[Exstal]

Majority focus of Final Fantasy is PvE.

[Vallhallix]

Summoners sometimes have mana issues

I don't see how. SMN spells dont hit mp as hard as the other casters do.

SMNS skills do not take up much mp at all. Even in heavy fights they should have a lot. The only time a SMN should ever run low on MP is if they're doing nothing but spamming ruin II or constantly having to rez people who keep dying as Rez is really the only mp heavy spell SMN has. Fester, the pet abilities etc require no mp at all. So really the main mp hogs during fights are the dots and all of them barely move the mp bar when casted. Keep in mind this is SMN and not BLM. A SMN should not be casting dots again right after they just applied them. Seeing as fester takes no mp to use, much of the smns mp loss from applying the dots the first time would have returned by the time he has to reapply them especially if contagion was used.

Even IF a SMN is having to rez people over and over they should still be able to get a large chunk of it back. Aetherflow's cd is not long at all. Aetherflow and a few energy drains instead of fester their bar should be full again or at 75% atleast. Ive had to rez people simultaneously during primals and still had enough mp. This was also while switching between ruin 1 & 2 and even using both at the same time to shoot two ruins at once.

Neither of the classes should have mana issues because the caster dps in this game are COMPLETELY OP.

You have BLM who can essentially sit in a spot spam heavy spells and get all his mp back by switching to umbra. Then you have SMN able to do 2000+ damage with an ability THREE TIMES that does not even require mp at all lol.

[Alkimi]

My least favorite things about BLM are losing fire starter procs to double procs and spell speed being junk.

Spell Speed is far from junk, it's actually been tested and comes out as BLM's best secondary stat (although not by a huge amount). Try having nearly 600 spell speed and a SCH with Selene out and you'll soon change your mind.

[Tempting]

Majority focus of Final Fantasy is PvE.

While I agree, since SE is trying to do PvP it means PvE can't be the ONLY focus which is why I said most of the recommendations were ONLY for pve and would have ZERO effect for the terrible dps that is blm pvp.

[Aikaal]

Snips

Summoners can easily go oom in T8 after 4 minutes if they go all out. They either need to have a bard singing all the time or to use Energy Drain.

It is a different story in T9. There are down times where the Summoner gets his mana. Honestly, if you don't know how to use Aetherial Manipulation, don't even bother go BLM T9.

My least favorite things about BLM are losing fire starter procs to double procs and spell speed being junk.

You must be at the bottom of DPS if you think that way. Puro Strider spreadsheets put SpellSpeed almost on par with Crit. Determination is the least favorable stat you want.

Puro Strider Spread Sheet