Black Mage Revamp

[Krr]

Nobody is asking for pumice stones and things like that.

Pining for the 'real black mage' of nostalgic 'classical final fantasy' is pining for exactly that. We are pointing out that it's a terrible, flawed, boring design that works nothing like people claim it did.

I'd like to see black mage remain as it is with small tweaks to spells such as Freeze that offer neither utility nor have a place in a rotation. All three elements (Fire, Ice, Lightning) have a core place in an optimized BLM rotation. Anyone stating that the class is 'just a fire mage' isn't doing their theorycraft right, because thundercloud procs and filler blizzards are essential parts of the job's spell rotation.

Remove elemental resistances from all characters and replace them with a single magic defense modifier. Enemies don't actually use elemental defenses themselves; all player-based magic in the game is simply 'magic damage' with tooltip fluff added. Allow players to convert existing elemental materia into materia that isn't trash.

There. Black Mage, and terrible legacy elemental resistance mechanics, are fixed.

[Renik]

The majority of players pining for a 'real black mage' are pining for nostalgia about elemental resistances and weaknesses that didn't actually matter in older FF games, because targeting weaknesses wasn't as important as figuring out how many flares, ultimas, or doomsdays you could pump out in one turn, and against 80% of enemies your element choice didn't matter.

I'd like to see black mage remain as it is with small tweaks to spells such as Freeze that offer neither utility nor have a place in a rotation.

nostalgia is a big selling point of this game, it doesn't matter if you find it useless or not, if we had to care only about utility we could just have a big button with the word attack, because, why do we need a rotation? useless...

These little things are here to make the game more attractive, that's why we have nice looking graphics instead of a wall of text in a black screen.

Utility is heavily overrated nowadays.

[Jennika]

Enemies don't actually use elemental defenses themselves; all player-based magic in the game is simply 'magic damage' with tooltip fluff added.

I think this is the part that I can't seem to get over. It's simply 'magic damage' but they label it as "elements". In my mind, logically ice should not damage ice, etc. If they'd made new magic names for it it might bug me less, but who knows. /shrug

[Krr]

I think this is the part that I can't seem to get over. It's simply 'magic damage' but they label it as "elements". In my mind, logically ice should not damage ice, etc. If they'd made new magic names for it it might bug me less, but who knows. /shrug

I think a lot of this is better fixed through encounter design rather than a rock-paper-scissors game system - like making certain underspoken utilities useful. For instance, if most 'fire' themed enemies could be made easier with Bind and Heavy effects in some consistent way, you'd be encouraged to use all the water/ice/etc themed spells in the game that categorically inflict those effects. Conversely, you could make bursty AOE damage (the forte of most fire-themed spells in the game) not as relevant or useful or even detrimental to their encounters, you'd find a lot less wanton fireblasting heading in their direction.

The same goes for other aspects of lore! If Dragons are designed to be single, large, HP-generous enemies with lots of incidental physical damage, or that sticky mobility gives a reasonable advantage to, then you've just made Dragoons feel like they're actually battling a favored enemy without making them mandatory.

nostalgia is a big selling point of this game, it doesn't matter if you find it useless or not, if we had to care only about utility we could just have a big button with the word attack, because, why do we need a rotation? useless...

So you're telling me that nostalgia for Final Fantasy is the only reason for Black Mages, or any job, to have more than one button?

[Duelle]

nostalgia is a big selling point of this game, it doesn't matter if you find it useless or not, if we had to care only about utility we could just have a big button with the word attack, because, why do we need a rotation? useless...

These little things are here to make the game more attractive, that's why we have nice looking graphics instead of a wall of text in a black screen.

There's a difference between aesthetic nostalgia and what some of these people are asking for. Aesthetic nostalgia is this being based on this to make it recognizable. It is also the reason our races are variations on the races used in FFXI. The nods to past games are part of this too. This is fine because its relatively easy to insert and plays on nostalgia by making stuff recognizable to a degree.

It's another thing to lift something from a console RPG design and try to cram it into an MMORPG. It's a matter of mechanics, and mechanics from one genre into another do not make the transition intact because stuff has to change for it to fit. Sometimes certain mechanics do not make it at all. Resistances just happens to be one of those things.

Utility is heavily overrated nowadays.

Utility, even at the bleeding edge, shapes how the masses perceive a job for good or ill. MNK happens to have the highest melee DPS in the game combined with a debuff that is important overall (would love to say "only in Final Coil" but Dragon Kick has been a favorite for a while now).

There. Black Mage, and terrible legacy elemental resistance mechanics, are fixed.

I'd have no problem with this. The next logical step would otherwise be to gate stuff through elemental resistances (the way raiding was tuned in vanilla WoW). Though IMO materia as a whole needs to be revamped system-wise (AKA how materia is acquired and applied to gear + what gear can have materia melded).

[Anapingofness]

I just wish they would give BLMs all of the elemental spells and make WHM light/astral element... instead of casting Aero, they cast Dia, instead of Earth they cast Banish, etc.

[Renik]

So you're telling me that nostalgia for Final Fantasy is the only reason for Black Mages, or any job, to have more than one button?

The same way you use extreme examples like having to melee with a staff because you're out of MP. But no, i'm telling you that we have more than one button because it makes things interesting and fun, no one would play a class that is about mashing 1 button. I'm not against the current BLM mechanics, but BLM is supposed to be a master of elements capable of exploiting the elemental weakness of certain enemies, but don't try to use the word exploit against my argument, they should use it to reach their top damage, but not superior to other classes.

Anyways, the elemental wheel brings a lot of depth to most RPGs, the only reason for its removal is having a faster and easier balance for a rushed relaunch, you may like it or not, but most RPGs have it because it's interesting.

There's a difference between aesthetic nostalgia and what some of these people are asking for. Aesthetic nostalgia is this being based on this to make it recognizable. It is also the reason our races are variations on the races used in FFXI. The nods to past games are part of this too. This is fine because its relatively easy to insert and plays on nostalgia by making stuff recognizable to a degree.

It's another thing to lift something from a console RPG design and try to cram it into an MMORPG. It's a matter of mechanics, and mechanics from one genre into another do not make the transition intact because stuff has to change for it to fit. Sometimes certain mechanics do not make it at all. Resistances just happens to be one of those things.
Utility, even at the bleeding edge, shapes how the masses perceive a job for good or ill. MNK happens to have the highest melee DPS in the game combined with a debuff that is important overall (would love to say "only in Final Coil" but Dragon Kick has been a favorite for a while now).
.

It have been done before, they just took some wrong steeps here making the old BLM unplayable in this game, you know, they can't exploit weakness as i previously said because they decided to split all the elements between 2 classes, if we bring back the elemental wheel BLM would be gimped in some battles, in that way you're right, the elemental wheel couldn't make it to this MMO, but this is the result of a egoistical choice taken by a part the dev team alone, i still remember a lot of complains from the testers when they noticed there were no elemental wheel in the game, they just ignored us and as result we have people used to it who will never want to change it.

I'm not saying they should change it, it's too late, i'm just expressing my disappointment with the current system, and may be in the future they can use it as reference.

Most offline RPG's have it. Online RPG's not nearly as prevalent. The way Black Mage works currently allows for some level of depth. If they had access to all six elements then the only thing they'd do is just cast the most damaging spell they can based off of the element weakness of the enemy they're facing. That's immensely tedious and boring really.

You just got me editing the post to answer Duelle, but yes, that's basically what i said. with one difference, they could use the current system but implemented with some of the ideas in the OP, to avoid the skill spamming.

[Mirron]

Most offline RPG's have it. Online RPG's not nearly as prevalent. The way Black Mage works currently allows for some level of depth. If they had access to all six elements then the only thing they'd do is just cast the most damaging spell they can based off of the element weakness of the enemy they're facing. That's immensely tedious and boring really.

[whoopeeragon]

I just wish they would give BLMs all of the elemental spells and make WHM light/astral element... instead of casting Aero, they cast Dia, instead of Earth they cast Banish, etc.

Because they can't? WHMs are a job ON TOP of Conjurer. With a long long history of association with Gridania, a place where the Elementals are worshipped, particularly those that are corporeal (water, wind and earth).

The traditional BLM started off with Fire, Lightning and Ice, which the current BLM heralds to. The only game where the BLM job had access to all six elements is FFXI.

The introduction of an Elemental wheel will also affect more jobs than just BLM and WHM. NIN's ninjutsu relies on elements as well, as does BRD (Flaming Arrow & Windbite) and DRG (Dragonfire Dive).

[lynyan]

elemental wheel

elemental wheels don't work in mmos dude, get over it.