Black Mage

[Altera]

Someone copypasted this to me when I talked to people ingame about the state of BLMs and why I rarely see others around much lately.
And it isnt a fun survey to read :/

Most common switches to which class (PREVIOUS MAIN to NEW MAIN)
PLD to DRK
BRD to PLD
AST to WHM
DRK to PLD
WHM to AST
WAR to PLD
DRG to DRK/SAM
BLM to RDM/BRD/MCH/DRG
NIN to DRK/BRD/AST/PLD
SCH to AST/WHM
SMN to PLD/RDM
MNK to NIN/PLD
MCH to BRD

Most common switches (common classes people have switched from)
DIDN'T CHANGE
BLM
SCH
WAR
MNK
SMN
DRG
NIN
DRK
WHM
MCH
BRD
AST
PLD

[Airget]

This thought crossed my mind watching this clip of a BRD's mobility being used to bait 2 mechanics in the new Ultimate content.

https://clips.twitch.tv/LachrymoseAt...ttleKappaClaus

What if Scathe could proc Fire III like Firestarter? When it comes to needing to move BLM loses a lot of potency that can be hard to recover from however if SE changed Scathe's proc to proc Fire III instant cast rather than just double it's potency it could help to keep the momentum of DPS in moments where a BLM is forced to move around so much.

[TsuKoj]

It's been stated multiple times before in the thread, but mobility isn't the issue with blm atm or at least not the biggest one. The issue is that even when a blm has 100% turret uptime, they are still doing less dps than other classes. Blms identity is the immobile caster turret, and that's great, each class should have clear advantages and disadvantages. But they aren't properly compensated for their lack of mobility. Giving blms more mobility or giving then a raise isn't going to help blms as a whole, it's just going to close the floor and the ceiling for the job a bit. The problem is the ceiling is too low, anything short of significant dps buff or a redesign of the identity of the class itself isn't going to make blm anymore desirable.

Edit- to emphasize my point, blms in the 90th percentile have 99%+ uptime(I'm sitting at 99.5%) and still do 200 less dps than smn/sam on 1-3 and less than smn/sam/mnk on 4 while being only 100 higher or equal to drg/mch.

[Remedi]

that's an average at max dps blm have a higher cap then the other dps jobs, which leads to the problem of us having maybe a too big dps delta.
Personally I think they should balance the dmg of BLM in movements heavy fight to be on par or lower then SAM while higher a def higher dps in standing still situation (or patchwerk fight for who came from wow) this would also combat he fact that there's no caster meta comp.
Probably the ranged meta would win out eventually but we are talking about alternatives and not the next big thing

[TsuKoj]

All the max dps shows is that arrow > spear, and blms use arrow better than other people since they don't have ogcds. The max parses(for dps) are all padded parses where they feed the dps all the balance + spears, or for blm balance + arrow.

The max on o1s and o2s belong to a blm with near 100% single target(might even be enhanced) balance + arrow uptime and one of the blms even had their tank switch to smn just to feed contagion. The max on o3s are all groups with a 9:18-9:30 kill time, they held the boss until the adds spawned then did a balance + infusion quad flare. After those 6 blms it's a bunch of sams/smns with 8:30 kill times before the next blm shows up. In fact if you sort it by damage to boss, suddenly all the blms drop off extremely hard on o3s. On neo ex the max isn't even worth talking about since it's a long time before a blm shows up. The only non-padded max damage for blm that is comparable to the other classes is on exdeath, but it's still beat by smn and mnk.

The fact that you need a whole team sacrificing their dps(on the max blm parses, the other party members that are usually purple>oranges are instead grey>blue) for a blm just for the blm to match sam and smn.

[Lelila38]

Blm has always been the job that got most out of knowing the fight, knowing when they could stand still and put up their dmg buff, knowing which attacks to dodge to manawall/ward and which to eat.
Just since Sb all that doesn't matter anymore. You can literally play perfectly and still do lower dps.
The play perfectly and be rewarded by high dps that Blm used to have is gone. And it makes the class no longer feel rewarding to me.

[Remedi]

That needs to come back definitively

@tsukoji Ye I understand what you say, but we kinda need a way to get a measure of relative power and potential a job has and honestly all jobs can pad their dmg one way or the other some even easier than BLM tbf ofc the fact that is a padded parse and how that was obtained is something to be taken in consideration too, because as you said if to obtain such a power requires a big sacrifice from everyone that is bad
That said there are some BLM on eregular parses on O3s and they are ok on the main boss to the point I think they didn't change target which can be ok if you know that it'll die regardless in a few hits.

Heck I tell you I would honestly swap royal road effect iof bole and balance with ewer and spire

[Komaru_Tatoro]

Reading this makes me sad. I'm not alone, yet our voice aren't heard compare to smn in this recent patch. We really got no raid utilities that make us unique anymore. Can't the dev make LL sharable even in a nerfed form so that BLM can have a place in raids? ;_;
pugging for o4s clear for a week. no one joins a blm pf, meanwhile ppl posting on pf clearing for alt, gets fill up faster than eating a full course meal. then look at the pf to see there's not a single spot for blm on any of the clear parties.... why am I still playing a blm???

[Oshirigami]

I disagree with the idea of making ley lines buff allies that a number of others have said. It's just... too much like what every other job has been getting. Just straight up buff ley lines damage to BLM themself and it'll make them put down the numbers they should when they time its use correctly. Simple.
Every job does not need raid party buffs. But for them to be taken over a job that does have one, their personal dps needs to match the personal+contributed dps that others like NIN, DRG, MCH, and BRD provide.
The problem is that you currently have the top MCHs doing something like only 6% less personal damage than the top BLMs do, while also giving everyone in the party 6% damage which heavily outweighs that bit lower personal damage.
BLM needs something like 6-8% more DPS, which a 10-15% damage buff to ley lines would provide.

Personally I like having the job in content with me, even though I don't play it. It's easy to do decent damage with, even if it's not top. You don't see BLMs seeming to do less damage than your tank like you do with Monks, so much. But with how unfavorable the class is with its current tuning, I don't see a lot of them.

Also yes, the class is very strong in dungeons, in the new 24 man, etc, but this raid tier favors in many ways SMN, particularly as it relates to movement. This is why most of my proposed suggestions for the class would help it with movement rather than damage, its damage is definitely high it just can't optimize said damage effectively, like, say, SAM can.

I have to say, I'd prefer BLM having its lack of mobility but to have damage to make up for it. Hence why I think a significant Ley Lines buff would be a nice, at least short term, fix for the job.
Better mobility just makes it more like the other ranged DPS jobs.

I actually wish they had left the HW Enochian mechanic untouched. It was far more fun to me than it is now. Basically press the button once per fight then forget about it, kinda lame. But I really liked HW feel of Blm, so that might be the reason. Also losing half our skills with the class redesign kinda killed it for me.

I didn't play back then, but as I said, yeah the job seems boring and unappealing to me. Regardless, I think a lot of people like how it plays, and have the very fair point that the job doesn't do enough damage for the lack of utility and mobility it has.

Dunno, I keep thinking I really like the idea of BLM having a counter-spell that can block something that'd be a one-shot kill or close to it, and return utterly massive damage in return. It's something skillful, unique, and adds big damage to a good deal of content.
Like you hit the button, and you have a buff for 3 seconds that'll negate the next damage that would otherwise be 50% or more of your health, and return some huge damage in return.
It shouldn't stop disables, but the damage should be so big that being disabled for a few seconds is worth the damage done.

[Komaru_Tatoro]

I disagree with the idea of making ley lines buff allies that a number of others have said. It's just... too much like what every other job has been getting. ... Simple.
Every job does not need raid party buffs.

while not every job needs a raid ability but almost every job HAS a raid ability that BLM had to compete against. The only other dps left without any kind of raid ability is SAM but since its mobile and is easy to use to get high dps, BLM really got the short end of the stick.
Have you ever main a BLM and stick to it even without switching class for the higher raids? Not really picking you but BLM just can't compete with other dps when they can bring the overall raid dps higher than personal gain. Which is why BLM don't get pick most of the time for progs and even now for serious Ult Coil prog groups, smn/rdm > blm.