Why do people want Blue Mage in this game?

[Yasuhiro]

Who said anything about WANTING this?

Because going out and learning spells from random enemy encounters is not something they consider core to being a Blue Mage? Maybe they want the perks of a Blue Mage without having to go above and beyond what other jobs have to do to learn their own skills?

Beats me, senpai.

[Niwashi]

Unlike some of the things I've seen people ask for around here, it's not for special snowflake reasons. It's because it clashes with the system in place for ability distribution, You're not going to have a BLU eating an item to learn a spell, nor eating the mob (outside of story cutscenes), much less learn spells by getting hit with them when most mob abilities only deal damage. You have to design abilities from the ground up to have effects and the synergy necessary to justify their place in the BLU spellbook.

How would the (obviously necessary) need for designing the skills themselves impact how you would or would not learn them? The main thing that makes a Blue Mage a Blue Mage is that they learn their spells from mobs in some fashion, though exactly how they do so has varied between different games in the series.

I actually think IX's pattern of Quina eating weakened mobs would work well here. It probably wouldn't be a matter of "eating" them per se, since that was as much a racial thing about the Qu as a Blue Mage thing, but we could have some equivalent sort of high failure rate finisher move on weakened enemies that, if successful, could lead to learning a skill (in cases where that mob type has a skill available to learn).

Once SE has determined what skills "have effects and the synergy necessary to justify their place," those skills would simply have to be distributed among mob types at the appropriate levels, so Blue Mages could fight those mobs to learn them. There's nothing special about gaining a level or completing a quest that indicates those are the only two ways of leaning a skill. They're simply the two ways already in use for other (non blue mage) classes and jobs.

[WinterLuna]

I'd have considered replying to the actual thread, but the ex-WoW comment had me laughing. Don't make assumptions like that.

[Duelle]

Once SE has determined what skills "have effects and the synergy necessary to justify their place," those skills would simply have to be distributed among mob types at the appropriate levels, so Blue Mages could fight those mobs to learn them. There's nothing special about gaining a level or completing a quest that indicates those are the only two ways of leaning a skill. They're simply the two ways already in use for other (non blue mage) classes and jobs.

The thing is that all classes are designed around 18 abilities and 11 traits, with 10 job abilities on top of that. You could make an ability system exclusive to BLU, but I find that unlikely given how crunched for time the devs say they are; it'd be cheaper and more efficient to build something off the acquisition system already in place.

Secondly, most monster skills deal only damage and few are those that have anything that would work for BLU without any changes. Some of them are even exclusive to dungeons. For example if BLU had access to Rhyno Attack from beetles, you could have them learn it by being hit by the attack enough. Problem is beetles that use Rhyno attack only exist in Hard Mode Lost City of Amdapor. It'd be better to just let the BLU get a weak version of the ability upon reaching the required level and unlock the spell's full power by killing X number of mobs belonging to the beetle family; including the lv1 beetles that are outside Ul'dah.

[Niwashi]

The thing is that all classes are designed around 18 abilities and 11 traits, with 10 job abilities on top of that. You could make an ability system exclusive to BLU, but I find that unlikely given how crunched for time the devs say they are; it'd be cheaper and more efficient to build something off the acquisition system already in place.

If they're going to add any job at all it means designing and adding new skills, regardless of how crunched for time they are. I'm sure that's a far bigger effort than simply coding the timing of when a skill is unlocked.

And the number of skills could be similar to other jobs if they want it to be. (It might also be fun if they added lots of available skills and let us slot a given number of them, but I agree that that particular variation would take more development effort.) The number of skills and the means of obtaining them are two quite different issues.

Secondly, most monster skills deal only damage and few are those that have anything that would work for BLU without any changes. Some of them are even exclusive to dungeons. For example if BLU had access to Rhyno Attack from beetles, you could have them learn it by being hit by the attack enough. Problem is beetles that use Rhyno attack only exist in Hard Mode Lost City of Amdapor. It'd be better to just let the BLU get a weak version of the ability upon reaching the required level and unlock the spell's full power by killing X number of mobs belonging to the beetle family; including the lv1 beetles that are outside Ul'dah.

Well, I don't really see a problem with learning something from the Lost City of Amdapor, if it comes to that, but if they want it available on a wider scale, they'd just include more mobs in the list of enemies you can learn it from. It's not that different from your own suggestion here about adding more mobs to the list of ones that can boost a spell to its full power. The main difference being I'd only include mobs at a level appropriate to when the skill should be learned. (I just can't see boosting the power of a level 50 skill by killing a few level 1 beetles.)

You object to learning a skill by fighting mobs as too much of a departure from the current system, but then suggest in its place we effectively learn traits by fighting mobs instead, which is at least as big of a departure from the current system. (That's if this "unlocking the spell's full power" you mentioned is effectively a trait, which is the nearest equivalent to that I can think of.)

Don't get me wrong. I like your idea, too. I just don't think it's the only option. Learning blue magic by using some type of magic-capturing skill (like Quina's "Eat" command from IX) while fighting specific mobs would work as well.

[SendohJin]

Problem is beetles that use Rhyno attack only exist in Hard Mode Lost City of Amdapor. It'd be better to just let the BLU get a weak version of the ability upon reaching the required level and unlock the spell's full power by killing X number of mobs belonging to the beetle family; including the lv1 beetles that are outside Ul'dah.

they can put all of those inside the job quests.

[Tanathya]

I will be shocked if Rdm isn't the melee version of Brd/Mch. They can take the RDM just about everyone wanted in FFXI and give it to us here.

It should be noted that most people are not saying the don't want BLU (that includes Yoshi P)... they are just saying with the design of FFXIV most options for BLU end up with a terrible version of the BLU.

Just like they've done to other jobs. They'll just shrug it off once BLU's out.

[Duelle]

If they're going to add any job at all it means designing and adding new skills, regardless of how crunched for time they are. I'm sure that's a far bigger effort than simply coding the timing of when a skill is unlocked.

I would think so, but between Yoshida having said the balance team doesn't want to do 2 new jobs for an expansion because it's too much work combined with what we got with Heavensward (MCH and AST are a little too similar to other classes, with the latter built to mimick the two existing healers instead of aiming to do its own thing), I'm not exactly brimming with confidence. I more expect them to stick to existing systems and go from there.

Well, I don't really see a problem with learning something from the Lost City of Amdapor, if it comes to that, but if they want it available on a wider scale, they'd just include more mobs in the list of enemies you can learn it from. It's not that different from your own suggestion here about adding more mobs to the list of ones that can boost a spell to its full power. The main difference being I'd only include mobs at a level appropriate to when the skill should be learned. (I just can't see boosting the power of a level 50 skill by killing a few level 1 beetles.)

The way dungeon runs go wouldn't really accommodate spell learning, but my point was that dungeon mobs seem to have more in the way of abilities with effects that could work for BLU. Another example is the fact that overworld Vultures don't have a knockback built into Wing Cutter, whereas Vultures in dungeons do (at least as of the last time I had anything to do with Vultures). So if you wanted BLU to learn Wing Cutter to have access to a knockback ability, you'd either have to change overworld Vultures so that their Wing Cutter has the knockback, force the BLU to learn it in a dungeon, or implement an alternative that bends the rules.

[MagiusNecros]

Since they would probably want to make the Blue Mage something of their own design if integrated I can totally see them using the Primals attacks abilities as the BLU's main spells/weaponskills because that's just how they roll. Could probably look at the recent Raubahn fight for some pointers. Even if personally it was basically human Ifrit and a one trick pony battle.

Raubahn's very name being a homage to the Blue Mage NPC of XI.

[LineageRazor]

Beats me, senpai.

It should be pretty clear from context, but what I meant to say was, "Who said anything about me WANTING this?" Still, it's a lot easier to try to make a weak attempt to undermine an argument by searching past posts for self-contradiction than it is by providing any sort of meaningful counterpoints of your own, isn't it?

Secondly, most monster skills deal only damage and few are those that have anything that would work for BLU without any changes.

This was a concern for me when I first started the game. Fresh out of the gates of Gridania, it took me a while to realize monsters were even USING special skills, and I only figured it out when I saw that some of the flying text damage numbers had text by them. I was thinking about BLU, even back then, and despaired that it would never work in this game simply because the mobs all had boring, damage-only attacks that barely looked any different from their standard attack animations.

Now, though, I feel that there are plenty of monster skills flashy enough that they'd go well in a BLU's arsenal. The aoe Stun used by boar mobs is a good example. Bad Breath, a BLU classic, could still work, though I'd guess it'd wind up being useless in anything outside of faceroll easy content (much like ACN's Tri-Bind).

As for mob types that only exist in advanced dungeons, bear in mind that BLU, if added, would be added in a new expansion with new areas - and Yoshi P has already stated that accessing these areas would NOT require full completion of ARR and Heavensward. There may be new low-level areas, in which BLUs could fight weaker versions of those mobs specifically to learn those skills. Even if there are no new low-level areas, there's nothing stopping SE from adding such mobs to existing low-level areas, specifically to help BLUs along. While I still doubt SE will make any kind of special learning system (and certainly not an RNG-fest like FFXI had), it's a mistake to assume that just because some skills are only present in high-level areas now, that that will always be the case!