BLM needs some love and RDM needs a nerf

[Lunafreya]

I've since changed to Red Mage from BLM sub. They are just so much fun to play and I love being mobile. I think blm is just incredibly boring when you compare the two especially after the fire iv nerf. I might get blm to 70 though to see if foul is cool.

[Llugen]

It sheds light on how the 4.0 skills and their proposed changes to our rotation is ultimately futile. It seems that SE did the "This piece gear is different because the colors are different" treatment on us. The PPS of the 3.0 rotation is almost the same as our 4.0 rotation. The only significantly good thing Stormblood gave us is the incredibly powerful AOE potential thanks to T4P and UH letting us Flare>Foul>Flare every AF window.

Feels bad man

Personally I see no problem with BLM being weaker single target damage than summoner but stronger aoe damage, the thing is that would mean they have to design fights well around that, which they're generally terrible at doing (See also, all of patches 2.2 and 2.3).

The main issue here is that SMN is stronger single target AND provides significantly more utility (magic/physical vuln, devotion, raise, the role pool skills), and then everyone knows red mage is god tier utility and does pretty decent damage as well.

[Galvuu]

Personally I see no problem with BLM being weaker single target damage than summoner but stronger aoe damage, the thing is that would mean they have to design fights well around that, which they're generally terrible at doing.

The main issue here is that SMN is stronger single target AND provides significantly more utility (magic/physical vuln, devotion, raise, the role pool skills), and then everyone knows red mage is god tier utility and does pretty decent damage as well.

The issue is that both (SMN and BLM) are considerably weaker than MNK/SAM/NIN/BRD/RDM (and that's 5 strong picks for 4 slots, so we're sitting this one out with the DRGs and MCHs).
The graver issue for BLM is that our new tools/mechanics outside of Foul made us weaker in most raids. So when I'm farming EX primals or doing Deltascape, I'm pretty much always better ignoring the Umbral Heart thing and just using Triple/Foul.
So a third of my new toys are actually rubbish.

[Lelila38]

Personally I see no problem with BLM being weaker single target damage than summoner but stronger aoe damage, the thing is that would mean they have to design fights well around that, which they're generally terrible at doing (See also, all of patches 2.2 and 2.3).

The main issue here is that SMN is stronger single target AND provides significantly more utility (magic/physical vuln, devotion, raise, the role pool skills), and then everyone knows red mage is god tier utility and does pretty decent damage as well.

The problem with that is that Blm has zero party utility, the only thing we had, Apoc, was opened to all casters.
SE keeps defending their op Sam by saying they should be top as they have no other benefits for the group. That logic should apply to Blm as well.

[Ferrasper]

Personally I see no problem with BLM being weaker single target damage than summoner but stronger aoe damage, the thing is that would mean they have to design fights well around that, which they're generally terrible at doing (See also, all of patches 2.2 and 2.3).

The main issue here is that SMN is stronger single target AND provides significantly more utility (magic/physical vuln, devotion, raise, the role pool skills), and then everyone knows red mage is god tier utility and does pretty decent damage as well.

What everyone else said basically. Only having BLM be good at AOE would only make them good for expert runs, and that is about it. They would have no use for raids or anything else. BLM needs to be the top caster dps at AOE and single target for us to be taken to raids because we do lack the utility. I do think we should have numbers close to Sam like in the 4500 range of damage for single and Aoe.

[RLofOBFL]

Maybe nerf RDM a smaaaaaall bit but definitely buff BLM. It's the caster equivalent to SAM but far weaker for some reason.

[Tman00]

There is no reason why BLM shouldn't be top DPS when standing still. Freaking SAM beats us in dummy fights too! There is no reason why a BLM that can minimize downtime shouldn't be on the top of the DPS. Thats why I said we needed potency increases across the board. We need to catch up and the only way to catch up is to hit even harder.

[CecMiller]

Personally I see no problem with BLM being weaker single target damage than summoner but stronger aoe damage, the thing is that would mean they have to design fights well around that, which they're generally terrible at doing (See also, all of patches 2.2 and 2.3).

The main issue here is that SMN is stronger single target AND provides significantly more utility (magic/physical vuln, devotion, raise, the role pool skills), and then everyone knows red mage is god tier utility and does pretty decent damage as well.

I know this is a buff BLM thread, but please - who do you think you're fooling? SMN better single target? Summoner is currently the worst dps at almost every percentile. BLM is above them for every percentile as is Red mage. If you don't believe me, just check here:

https://www.fflogs.com/statistics/15/#dataset=70

Not even going to comment on stuff like devotion (hint: It's garbage). SMN will almost never be using mana shift as it hurts their dps a ton more than it hurts a BLM's or RDM's. SMN's use for the new virus is just an extra wyrmwave atm. What SMN has over BLM atm is the ability to raise, slightly less time in turret mode (you wanna be casting Ruin 1 or Ruin 3 most of the time and standing still in bahamut casting Ruin 2 because bahamut is dumb), and either its magic buff or its phys buff. It won't use both as there is a huge mana cost to switching pets (and you MUST use swift otherwise its even more silly). Further, shockwave from garuda (the knockback) shares the cooldown with radiant shield (the phys buff which only activates when you get hit) and therefore if you've used shockwave on garuda, it's even more pointless to switch. Even with the magic buff that summoner has, it STILL deals less damage than RDM and BLM both. The main reason you took SMN over BLM in 3.0 was raise. In 4.0, RDM was introduced which is just summoner, but better in every way save buffing magic damage. No bahamut to block your view, far easier to play and master, swift cast on demand, better mp management, better dps, by far less punishing for messing up mana vs. missing an aetherflow move or dying for that matter and a better party wide buff which is far more responsive/easier to use. I'm fine with RDM being the caster of choice to bring for prog/meta parties. I'm not fine with it being better than summoner in almost every way.

Play around with the percentiles and tell me where you see the stronger single target damage of the summoner. BLM needs a buff and SMN also needs one. The fact you think SMN's single target is superior to that of BLM's is laughable. If you're trying to make a case for buffing BLM's try to avoid comparing BLM to summoners which is in a worse state for more reasons than a simple "dps" problem. The fact of the matter is, the current standings are RDM > BLM > SMN. SMN is the lowest caster damage WITH contagion (A 10% magic damage boost every minute for 15 seconds). If SMN didn't have that ability, bless them - they'd be doing even worse. RDM is just superior to SMN in almost every way. The only thing RDM's lack is a way to buff magic classes, but lets face it, tanks and melee dps tend to do more dps than healers or casters to begin with and at least their buff is an instant cast and you don't have to fight retarded pet AI to get it off. Contagion is a piece of shit to use. According to the parses on fflogs, SMN is the 2nd least played(or parsed) classed after MCH and to compound the above problems playing SMN below 70 is complete crap.

Now, regarding the BLM situation, I would hope it does similar to SAM dps. It is silly that samurai is able to dish out the damage they do whilst not being as heavily as affected by mechanics like BLM is. At the same time, I see no reason why SMN should be so low in the standings of dps when it IS harder than both BLM and RDM to maximise your damage. Once MCH/DRG are buffed, if no changes are made to SMN, it'd be bottom of the dps being beaten by BRD and MCH across most levels of play and that's just sad. There will always be 1 class that is the weakest, but I think it's unfair that it is summoner considering how difficult it is to execute well.

With 4.0.5, we should hopefully see both BLM's and SMN's being buffed and/or RDM's being toned down. The current standings just show RDM's complete dominance over the other 2. The only time BLM beats RDM or comes close to beating them is at the 99th percentile (BLM is ahead by 1 dps). SMN is not even involved in that contest of which caster deals the most dps. It's sitting in a solid 3rd place.

[Age_of_Oblivion]

There is no reason why BLM shouldn't be top DPS when standing still. Freaking SAM beats us in dummy fights too! There is no reason why a BLM that can minimize downtime shouldn't be on the top of the DPS. Thats why I said we needed potency increases across the board. We need to catch up and the only way to catch up is to hit even harder.

Couldn't agree more. The turret caster should be the best in the game at blowing things up when it is able to stand still, by a wide margin. Mechanics hurt BLM efficiency way, way more than SAM.

[Kabooa]

Man, how ridiculous (and ultimately infuriating) would it be if Leylines gave the same bonus to your caster allies?

Utility, but then all those mechanics get centered on our safe space.