Black Mage

[zuzu-bq]

Nah convert is a really bad ability. Something that used to be very good and synnergized with BLM's kit and became weirdly akward and weak over the course of the game changes. Remember what Convert did on the course of the game.

During ARR era convert had great synergy into our simplistic kit, we could finish our Raging Strikes window with a bang, casting one single Flare that had a huge potency advantage over Fire, followed by a Convert, a Fire then Blizzard III time. Once convert was back up and so was Raging all we had to do was wait a fresh new Fire phase to unload that somewhat free buffed Flare again.

During Heavensward the concept of that was expanded. At the start we had only ten seconds of Astral Fire and low Spell Speed so people tried to make Convert fit in the opener for a Flare+Convert stack refresh. But since Fire IV was stronger better openers eventually showed up still expanding the concept to just fit more Spells in a tighter Astral Fire with Raging Strikes window and take advantage of Fire IV's extra potency inside Raging and Foe, which was a huge gain in the end. The second use of Convert was lined up with Raging and Ley Lines so we could o the same spells in that buff window once more.

Ok, by Stormblood... Flare and Fire IV have the same potency and our Astral Fire rotation is longer, so the idea would go back to the concept of using Flare as a stack refresh right? Yeah that can work, but also not doing a Flare is a better option to minimize clipping and taking advantage of Triple+Swift to shoot 4 Fire IV in a row without the self clip of the spell for a better gain. So we're back to the second situation of Heavensward using convert for a few more Fire IVs and that is it. What does that give us in reality isn't much because we don't have raw damage buffs to pair up with it anymore. All Convert really does is, in a pratical sense of synergy with our kit, is extend our opener so we can have a Foul charged by the end of it. Ok so now middle fight when Convert is back we can simply use it right? No, if you don't control MP ticks (oh look another issue that can be caused by them) with the right spell order on Umbral Ice you will not gain two Fire IVs from a convert! Simply because the MP provided by it is not 4800 but 4644. A difference of 166 MP that you want to have in your pool to burn in one more Fire IV. On top of that making Foul potentially clip in itself by making that cycle longer mid fight instead of going from a zero charged Polyglot (though that varies on encounters) while either making stack juggling on reopening harder or forcing a Sharp Fire in it to keep stacks. Which while isn't bad it is a smaller gain over a successful Sharp Thunder. All these little things add up on making Convert akward to use and at the same time too weak for its ridiculously long recast time.

Convert was mostly powerful for the fact it was used to extend a burst inside Raging Strikes, without a damage buff the ability became weak and with our new rotation it also became more akward to use. On top of that the HP cost just makes BLM more unliked by parties' healers specially on learnings and progression, yeah you can Manaward but then we go back to the "we always clip with ogcds" issue and having to work around that is yet another job issue that was discussed in this thread). Convert should either cause an extra effect, provide slightly more MP or have its recast reduced. Or any combination of those.

[Shiroe]

yep convert can kill you..., use it out of habit during ex-death v4s when its up, and you either die or get stoned..
(besides convert giving more mp or have a shorter cd, if should NOT cost ffing hp anymore!!!)

but convert is only one of many blm issues

[Solyra]

yep convert can kill you..., use it out of habit during ex-death v4s when its up, and you either die or get stoned..
(besides convert giving more mp or have a shorter cd, if should NOT cost ffing hp anymore!!!)

but convert is only one of many blm issues

Yes, fixing convert still won't fix the main issue behind BLM, which is, it doesn't actually bring anything significant to the raid (brings equivalent raw dps with no utility) and actually ACTIVELY HURTS THE RAID because they CAN'T DO MECHANICS to do the same DPS as other jobs. So not only are you now doing less damage, but you're hindering the group you're in? I'm honestly not surprised we're starting to see BLM excluded from groups now compared to rdm/smn.

[Llugen]

Honestly I'm not sure there's anything left to be said in this thread that hasn't already been said, so I'm just going to recap one more time to hammer it home:



-Convert desperately needs a fix (please take the opportunity to make it have 2 minute synergy for Hypercharge/Foe Requiem/Chain Stratagem/Trick Attack. In fact, if you ALSO want to reduce Ley Lines to be 20 seconds with 60s recast to line up with this, I'd be down)

-Umbral Hearts need a fix (Consider 10% or more damage increase for the heart-consuming spell, possibly consider the Freeze "proc" suggestion for aoe Umbral Hearts)

-Timers management/mobility could use some love (Consider additive Thundercloud to 60 seconds and/or allowing Thunder III to refresh Astral/Umbral timer, consider Firestarter II trait allowing for Fire IV to either proc Fire III or to allow Fire IV to use the proc)

-Foul could use some stronger single target potency (I suggest double potency on one target, current normal potency on 2 or more.)

-The job could really use some utility of any kind (parties always want utility and are burdened by "selfish DPS"), even if it's just something as simple as a 180s recast 5% speed buff for the party (Spread Arrow), or 10% Magic Vulnerability on Blizzard IV. Personally, I also feel like the DRG 10%/5% tether makes more sense on BLM conceptually, encouraging the tethered player to stay in range of the immobile caster, so consider throwing that in there for both burst/utility.

-Feel free to increase Enhanced Enochian to 15% or 20% if you're bored or want to be lame, I guess.



Hell, if you really want, give the class a special trait that allows it to move while casting any spell but doing so increases the time required to cast the spell by 10% (or 20% or even 30%). This would mean that you still wouldn't WANT to move while casting but at least you CAN without losing 90% of your potency, and you'd still want to stay in Ley Lines and manage your Triplecast/Swiftcast/Aetherial Manipulation appropriately. This obviously wouldn't solve the strength issue that the class is currently having, but it would at least make it far less punishing to handle.

[Rakith]

Honestly I'm not sure there's anything left to be said in this thread that hasn't already been said, so I'm just going to recap one more time to hammer it home:
...
.

Amen to that !!! ;-)
Let's hope SE reads our threads

[zuzu-bq]

They usually catch feedback from posts with more likes. So keep throwing likes on things you agree with or if you think people had good arguments even when you don't.

[Draxis_Fallspear]

I think the devs just need to get more creative in making the "selfish dps" thing work. It seems like their approach is based purely on potency.

Party buffs generally resume to giving a % increase in all/a certain type of damage to everyone who is alive at the time of the buff, for the duration of the buff. A selfish dps should have abilities that flip that around.

Give them a self buff that gives them stacks based on how many party members are alive at the time of the buff and have each stack give the selfish dps a % increase for the duration of the buff. That way, you're maintaining the idea of selfish dps; but giving it something that mechanically works pretty much exactly like a group wide buff. The choice then becomes whether the individual player is good enough for the return on investment to be maximized and worthwhile vs. the whole party being able to play optimally for the duration of the buff. Ideally, it should be set up to synergize with other raid buffs.

[zuzu-bq]

They don't need to be that creative. Just give selfish DPS jobs more damage. So they can actually justify to be selfish.

[Shiroe]

Honestly I'm not sure there's anything left to be said in this thread that hasn't already been said, so I'm just going to recap one more time to hammer it home:

yep all that has been said and recapped, could be helpfull / fix the blm

besides fixing the "you lose Enochian when you cast fire 1 (and want to sharpcast it) under astral-ice"

and give Blm a special Mana-Shift trait (since we are condemned to use it), like less Mp usage

[Remedi]

I'm actually open to a possible blizzard/fire mastery trait that would make our fire and blizzard spell becoming the IV counterpart during enochian tbh

And/Or scathe proccing firestarter and thundercloud (the actual proc is laughable)

Tbh I remain of the opinion that they should balance the average dps of BLM with movements in mind while making it very high in fights where they can turret (or when you learn how you can turret in a given fight)
TBF I think that rewarding with dps a correct adaptation to a boss rotation should be our kind of deal, with or without raid support skills

And tbh we had (and have) cases where raw power was attractive