So with all of this consolidation Why do we still have 4 different Fires?

[alimdia]

The only sort of consolidation I would have done with regard to BLM is to just replace Fire/Blizzard 1 with Fire/Blizzard 4 while Enochian is up, and actually allow those spells to affect Astral/Umbral like their tier 1 counterparts would.

You have to remember that Enochian is now always up, it has no timer, it's active as long as you have AF/UI, making fire 4 give AF means you never drop enochian, you're devolving BLM to the level 50 rotation with 1 extra button to hit (enochian) once in an entire battle.

[eschaton]

Good point OP, it's almost as if his team isn't working as a team at all. It would explain the many inconsistencies between the latest changes, and types of content at at.

[Fynlar]

You have to remember that Enochian is now always up, it has no timer, it's active as long as you have AF/UI, making fire 4 give AF means you never drop enochian, you're devolving BLM to the level 50 rotation with 1 extra button to hit (enochian) once in an entire battle.

Admittedly, I have not looked into the new SB stuff so I wouldn't have known this @_@

As for devolving, well, that's kind of what happens when you consolidate skills.

[alimdia]

Yeah but the point of this consolidation is trimming skills that have no use, which is not the case for BLM, the different skills are what make BLM more than single button spamming job, what OP is asking for is the equivalent of undoing every change added in HW and SB and going back to the shallow ARR BLM, this time more shallow without even dealing with procs.

[Nestama]

I just remembered the Umbral Hearts mechanic Blizzard IV will have. Nullified MP increase for three Fire spells and Flare's MP cost being reduced by two-thirds.

[Fynlar]

Yeah but the point of this consolidation is trimming skills that have no use

Unfortunately, that's something that's going to be debatable from player to player.

[Nestama]

But it's not really debatable when it comes to Fire. Every Fire spell has its own use (Fire to refresh Astral Fire so you can continue to cast Fire IV, keep Enochian up and have a chance to proc Firestarter. Fire II for AoE's. Fire III as your Transpose and to use when you get Firestarter. Fire IV for raw damage), whereas a spell like Stone... why would you even consider casting Stone I or II when you could/should be using III?

The only other BLM spell that I would consider changing is to make Blizzard become Blizzard IV. You're not gonna be casting Blizzard at all with Enochian up.

[Fynlar]

In my mind:

Fire 1: single target damage
Fire 4: single target damage

The way I see it, there's skill bloat/redundancy there. That's kinda the whole reason why skill consolidation is being brought up, isn't it?

The only reasons Fire 1 remains a relevant skill is because they arbitrarily made Fire 4 not refresh Astral Fire (which, let's face it, is honestly just weird considering every other Fire spell BLM has, even Flare, does so) and because, at least currently, Enochian may not always be able to be kept up. They apparently are trying to get rid of the latter problem in 4.0 (I don't know all the details of the planned changes with Enochian so I'm reluctant to say much else about it). I say why not get rid of the former one too and cut off the tumor completely instead of doing a half-assed job of it?

[Felis]

In my mind:

Fire 1: single target damage
Fire 4: single target damage

Fire 1: to keep Astral Fire up
Fire 4: let Astral Fire run out

[Nestama]

In my mind:

Fire 1: single target damage
Fire 4: single target damage

The way I see it, there's skill bloat/redundancy there. That's kinda the whole reason why skill consolidation is being brought up, isn't it?

It's only redundant because you're ignoring the Astral Fire (which keeps Enochian up, by the way) and the Firestarter proc Fire grants, whereas Fire IV is just a single target spell that does massive damage (260 potency in SB + Astral Fire III damage buff) you can only use while under the effects of Enochian and Astral Fire (of which it does not keep up).

Why even keep Enochian at that point?