Either SMN and RDM should lose their Raise or BLM should get a Raise.

[Remedi]

Summoner would still be okaish because dmg is fine and support is okaish not the best but still good, Red mage you are right and nobody cares because of raise.

However the threat management are very valuable to most even more than trick attack in some cases, some even advise SE to gut those or give them to the role action (mostly since MNK and SAM badly need something else).
So it's not as clear

[Llugen]

I don't know, that still sounds like exactly what we want, to me.

The whole point is that we do not want classes locked out because other classes bring "different" (read: significantly stronger) tools. I guess if that's what we're calling "homogenization", then fine, homogenize me, capp'n!~

[Ceallach]

No it's not, they just aren't affected nearly as much as an any other caster since they have built in MP recovery and MP is no longer relevant to Summoners damage. It has 66% less cost to DPS comparatively used with or without Swiftcast since Summoner has so much passive damage. Yes that belief that Raise is the main attraction of SMN is incorrect, but it's icing on the cake along with those other things you listed. I don't believe Raise on its own would make BLM attractive either, I've said this previously. They desperately need damage boosts and QoL fixes I agree, and if they got the necessary ones a Raise wouldn't even be necessary, but supposing they don't it means BLM is back on the shelf for another raid tier, which isn't fun. Player enjoyment and fun (e.g. play how you want to play) should be prioritized a bit more over lore worship for the sake of it. Raise itself is a group buff, it returns a player to the battlefield, meaning you either get a tank back, a healer back (losing either of these is most likely a wipe), or around 4000 more DPS you wouldn't otherwise have without it. Nobody believes SMN is a Raise Dispenser, that term is an 'affectionate' euphemism for Red Mage.

Ceallach a coding fluke isn't something that necessarily gets fixed immediately. Pretty much the reason SMN has Resurrection is because ACN needed it so SCH would have it. Plus I mean I get the importance of lore to a point, we had a very very large argument about it a while ago. But it's also a game, made for fun and enjoyment, the fact that people avoid taking their favorite class to progression outside of a static doesn't sound fun at all, it sounds very unfun. And I don't necessarily believe giving BLM a Raise variant is the answer, they could give them a powerful party wide defensive buff perhaps, I think someone mentioned group Manaward somewhere. There are a lot of things they could do within the lore as well, so I'd rather argue about what fun, creative group utility we could give to BLM than make a feckless waste about whether or not we should exclude a certain type of group utility. Plainly, I'd rather discuss ideas than discuss whether or not we should have an idea.


For example,

Aetherial Concentration (Trait): While your Ley Lines are active, your party regains MP (potency something something, close to Refresh maybe) while you're in Umbral Ice. While you're in Astral Fire your party does 1-2% more damage for each stack of Astral Fire you have.

Yes, a game should be fun, but no, the lore shouldn't take a backseat. You can toss around ideas all you like, but in the end, what actually happens needs to be both fun and in line with the lore. You have to consider both sides. If you don't, you're going to piss a lot of people off, which means losing a lot of players, which means losing a lot of money, not to mention all the trust SE would lose. Black mage getting a Raise variant would be the same level of idiocy as that pay-to-win system Star Wars: Battlefront II got so much flak for.

The lore of the franchise can be considered malleable but BLM has been constant in not having access to any raise or restorative spell and his elemental spells and garb are as iconic to the franchise as the chocobos, moogles, tonberries etc.
FF has created some tropes by itself and the moment they stray from it they get blasted to oblivion by the fanbase.

When ppl see a BLM they can expect what kind of spells they'll have access to and they can imagine their gamestyle, the same happens with other jobs, that's also the reason why SMN are very vocal about SMN not feeling like traditional FF SMN.
Ppl play this game expecting it to be a FF game and expect jobs to play in a similar manner and that is true for every game, tropes are needed to give you an idea of what a class can do, they play a part in making you choose what to play because by a simple name you know what to expect more or less.

Quoted for emphasis.

That's called being a team player and/or realizing before how I was talking about "personal damage does not outweigh group damage (read: someone lying on the floor)" BLM deserves not to be shut out of this incredibly valuable part of the role balance. (or, as mentioned before, access to this power needs to be SIGNIFICANTLY trimmed a la what Remedi has been saying).

You know what else is called "being a team player?" Doing your job well. It's not the black mage's job to get team members back up. It's the black mage's job to immolate all opposition before people die in the first place.

"jobs being the same" is why it's all the more important to have proper implementation (avoid homogenization). This is another "pro" that off-GCD raise would have.

It's more like a "con," but you refuse to listen to all the reasons why.

Consider also that there needs careful attention paid to what "being the same" even means. All the DPS do damage, all the healers do healing and raising and have some form of shield. All the tanks tank and have some kind of party defensive cooldown. Whatever playing "the same" means is pretty fast and loose.


If anything the caster role is the most wildly different of the bunch: RDM has no dots, and has every other cast instant with movement focus, SMN has two dots and off-GCD nuke focus, and BLM has one DoT and hardcast/recharge focus. Meanwhile, consider that all the melee have one DoT to manage, a buff/resistance down rotation, and a "filler" rotation, all of which is quite rigid. Why aren't we accusing them of "playing the same"? Adding ONE FUNCTION for the sake of balance (carefully considered) is far from making the casters "play all the same"

Uh, probably because they don't? You keep overlooking the fact that carefully considering the balance between red mage, summoner, and black mage shows that a Raise variant would hurt the black mage, who is already in a bad spot. Black mage does not need a Raise variant. It needs more damage, because again, black mage should be doing considerably more damage than red mage or summoner to justify its lack of utility, while red mage should be buffed up to summoner's level so that your choice between them is based on utility alone.

Having the raise would still homogenize the classes, not to mention spit in the faces of players who know that Raise hasn't really been a BLM thing since day one of the job's introduction all the way back in FF1, and hasn't been made available in specific exceptions (like job/custom systems but it's not even their own spell or where there's no real delineation between Black and White Magic like in FFVI to FFVIII).

The closest example of a black mage healing was FINAL FANTASY XI, in which you had a support job that was half the level of your main job. Specifically, BLM/SCH was able to heal to a point, and that was entirely because of what scholar was capable of at level 49 and how Light Arts worked. Absolutely none of that capability came from the black mage.

If I may,

White Mage kinda has a heal in Divine Benison, but they're not exactly all that good at it with just a 15% MHP barrier that costs all of the lillies that could speed up Assize and focuses heavily on Regens and pure healing + damage as well as having the objective best MP management of any healer. Astrologian is absolutely and utterly broken and does everything better than the other two healers to the point that you may as well delete White Mage and Scholar a jack of all trades that has either better barriers like than Scholar or almost better Regen like White Mage, as well as a heavy emphasis on utility cards and having the worst MP management and damage of the bunch. Scholar has been nerfed to the ground is a more strategic healer, using barriers to patch holes that need to be filled by oGCDs and flying garbage the fairy with the highest DPS potential and the mother of all multipliers that is Chain Stratagem.

As for tanks, Warrior is a murdertastic, DPS-focused tank that loses out on defense in favor of raw HP, and at one point lacked a party defense (until Shake it Off was reworked) and has the only buff-rotation of the three as well as the most spammable and powerful single target nuke (Fell Cleave). Paladin lacks much mechanics in the Oath Gauge beyond two oGCDs, but is highly defensive, has an actual heal spell and is utterly overpowered has the best tools to support the party. Dark Knight is utter trash has a constant DPS boost, the highest damage while in tank stance, a defensive utility that ALSO helps its offence, and has a significant emphasis on MP management, unlike the other two tanks (even Paladin who also uses MP for Clemency and Holy Spirit don't use it nearly as much as Dark Knight).

In addition, all of their tools are pretty much different, despite having "similar" types of tools. A Dark Knight doesn't play like a Warrior which doesn't play like a Paladin, and a White Mage doesn't play like a Scholar which doesn't play like an Astrologian. Hell, not all of their tools are even equivalent, which can be seen in the "common" skills between the three.

Warrior's two single target nukes, Fell Cleave and Inner Beast, are unique in being separate at all, with one being purely offensive with a whopping 500 potency base and the other being a self heal + utility hybrid. Bloodspiller needs both MP and Blood Gauge to hit as hard as Fell Cleave and Spit and Carve has a dual role depending on whether you use Dark Arts or not. Meanwhile, Holy Spirit is the only straightforward nuke of the bunch, and just uses MP.

White Mage has the two best "emergency" heals in the game, with Tetragrammaton having its cooldown reduced with Lillies and Benediction being a full heal, and then there's Plenary Indulgence which benefits from other AoE heals. Scholar's healing buttons are generally locked behind Aetherflow, while Astrologian only has two "reliable" healing oGCDs in Earthly Star for AoE and Essential Dignity for single target.

I can simplify this. White mage is a reactive, druidic healer that wields the elements to bring succor to his allies. Astrologian is a horribly misguided healer that uses the aether of the heavens to bargain with fate. Scholar is a proactive, strategic healer who plans ahead and makes sure the party can survive anything.

Cough cough, you're objectively wrong.

The only thing the melee jobs have in common is the DoT and the damage rotation, but even that is debatable. Monk doesn't conform to a "rotation", considering it has its unique form system, Samurai has nothing but buff rotations (Seriously, all three "rotations, Gekko, Kasha and Yukikaze provides a buff in some form, Yukikaze provides a slash debuff if there's no WAR or NIN, Kasha's prereq Shifu increases speed, and Gekko's prereq Jinpu increases damage) as well as being one of the few melee-ranged classes to have a cast timer for attacks, Dragoon has a buildup and oGCD focus much like Summoner (as well as the only four step comboes in the game) and Ninja has to weave Mudras on top of maintaining their combos. Hell, Bard and Machinist are also as different as night and day, with Machinist being able to "confirm" their RNG and use turrets, while Bard uses DoTs and stance dancing.

Gee, it's almost like the DPS roles aren't homogenized at all, even within their supposed "roles" and that calling for "role balance" by creating homogenization isn't exactly a productive idea.

THANK YOU! This, Llugen, is why so many of us don't think you have black mage's best interests at heart.

That paradox is keenly felt, certainly.

That's part of why I'm a little skeptical in general of it, as per my previous post. What even is "play the same"? We're all pressing GCDs and off-GCDs and maximizing our efficiency through the means given to us. We're ALL playing the same (I hope).

So because murderers and rapists are still human beings, they're the same as law-abiding citizens that do their taxes and take care of their families?

I understand that this is one hell of a comparison to make, but I want you to understand the gravity of how stupid your suggestion is.

"Unique", or at least, enough for me is aesthetic and general "feel" of the rotation, not access to direly useful (read: practically mandatory by the playerbase's standards) recovery tools.

Unique is BRD having dots and songs, while MCH has a turret and overheat, NOT that they both have access to support (dismantle/troubadour) or offensive utility (battle voice+foe requiem, hypercharge), not to mention of course the actual role pool skills. To me, that is different enough while still "able" to cover very close to the exact same role "requirements".

Unique is black mage being a turret to deal heavy damage in not much time, while summoner builds up to bigger pets and fights in tandem with them, while red mage moves all over the place and casts spells in pairs. OH WAIT.

Oh, and side note, we already hashed out the "precedent" thing, at least kind of. NIN could use some looking at as per role adjustment due to its invaluable enmity tools/Trick Attack, but saying that giving BLM access to Raise will pave the way for "all classes to beg for trick attack" is definitely a stretch in logic. Again, there's no expectation of the melee role to do healing or raising, but there IS an expectation of the caster role doing it. In fact, anecdotally, since Feint is still pretty new on the role, I see loads of melee being "uncomfortable" with its usage. Meanwhlie, casters have had access to tools like that forever (Virus, Eye for an Eye, Apoc, Raise), so I feel pretty confident in my stance.

That's the problem. You insist that you're right for no reason other than you're tired of being "forced" to play red mage or summoner. Ninja's enmity tools are good, but not critical like Trick Attack, and Trick Attack is the only real reason ninja's in the meta right now. As far expecting any Disciple of Magic other than black mage to be able to get a player back on his feet, that's actually an expectation to use every action at your disposal well. You know, something that's expected of literally every player in the game?

Also, at risk of sounding like an even bigger tool than I already have in this thread so far, I'm going to quote myself here with regard to your consideration for what balance would look like

Or you could just stop talking.

It's not even the same thing, trick attack can be given to other jobs because it's not a definitive trait of NIN ot anyone else, there's nothing that's stops other jobs from giving them trick attack or similar effects, I was surprised that overcharge is not exclusive with trick for example since they share debuff type.
All jobs could in fact inflict a weakness on the enemy and there's literally nothing that stops them.

Meanwhile Raise is an action that usually is relegated to healer-type jobs and we have it on some casters because of reasons we already discussed. While you may argue that they are extremely strong tools they are not in the same category.
A better comparison could be shadewalker or smoke bombs tbh,
That said that's why it would pave the way to homogenization, because you are literally asking them to add something that, while it would make the role balanced gameplaywise, it would be essentially break the functions of an RPG.
And if they fall to that, they will fall to anything else after.

Thank you!

[PrismaticDaybreak]

Maybe be a little less prickly about it. Nowhere did I say lore should take a backseat, the fact that people don't enjoy playing a game designed for entertainment is arguably more important than lore, no that doesn't mean lore isn't important. And you skimmed right past the main point of what I said, that'd I'd rather discuss fun and creative ideas to give something to BLM rather than waste time doing exactly this, arguing about what pithy types it should have, it's about as useless as trying to shovel snow in a blizzard.

Look more carefully at what I said, I do consider both sides. I don't necessarily think Raise is the right way to go but if the bottom line ends up being they need it for people to enjoy playing BLM versus just keeping them sad because lore then I'm going to put my chips on the let them play the damn game how they'd like side. Now I sincerely doubt it'll hit that point, if we look at Summoners current state and SE's history of overbuffing I'm sure BLM will be quite fine. Please please please please don't engage me on a "is lore important or not?" type discussion.

[Kabooa]

I don't know, that still sounds like exactly what we want, to me.

The whole point is that we do not want classes locked out because other classes bring "different" (read: significantly stronger) tools. I guess if that's what we're calling "homogenization", then fine, homogenize me, capp'n!~

It's not a binary flip for homogenized or not. It's degrees.

Put simply there is already a fair amount of homogenization in this game, where most of the distinction between jobs is how they interact with the game. Damage is fairly similar across the board for jobs within their roles but the manner in which they achieve it is what's different. The Class Role /Cross Class system is another layer of homogenization because certain tools are required to be in a toolkit (TP Recovery, MP Recovery, Threat Drops, etc)

Every Melee has a gap closer, every tank has damage reduction, every healer has a small, medium, and big single and aoe heal, every caster has a huge AoE nuke string.

It's hard to see Raise being some straw-and-camel scenario with that in mind.

It's not a technical limitation on Arcanist raise either. They have a fully functional sync system that works for jobs as far back as first zone fates. All they would need to do is put that Arcanist raise in Scholar's database at level 22. The backend exists for jobs being level 7ish from attributes to accessible actions.

[Llugen]

I mean, that's exactly what I'm getting at. I'm not sure why everyone's trying to pull the "homogenization" card on BLM Raise when it's very clear that there are loads of other things that are pretty well "homogenized".

[Cynfael]

Maybe be a little less prickly about it. Nowhere did I say lore should take a backseat...

Yep. This thread is starting to give me Healer DPS discussion PTSD, what with people being so quick to read dire criticism into fairly dry commentary on gameplay issues.

It's also apparently not acceptable to maintain any kind of nuanced opinion; you must declare for or against a side 100% or have a position assumed for you.

Game balance aside, I'm still boggled that we have pages of lore debate in a fantasy setting where it appears that magic=aether=can-do-nearly-anything. If I do start to slide into snark, it's because the persistent argument over whether or not BLM being allowed to raise anything is lore-allowable is increasingly taking on the tone of a "which superhero would win in a fight?" sort of discussion. If Scholars and Summoners can raise without Holy magic, if Ascians can maintain their aether indefinitely without a body, and if characters can be both dematerialized and rematerialized by means of aether, exactly what sort of spellcaster (read: manipulator of aether) in FFXIV couldn't reasonably be imagined to prop up a nearly-dead person in a fashion that's reasonably consistent with their Job theme?

I can certainly imagine ways for BLMs to scrape bodies off the ground, but my reason for opposing the idea is that I'm against the further proliferation of Resurrection skills outside of the Healer role. And I want to be selfish when I play BLM and continue not to care about fixing everyone else's mistakes; I play healer 99% of the time for Savage content and enjoy a BLM sociopathy break.

[Ceallach]

Maybe be a little less prickly about it. Nowhere did I say lore should take a backseat, the fact that people don't enjoy playing a game designed for entertainment is arguably more important than lore, no that doesn't mean lore isn't important. And you skimmed right past the main point of what I said, that'd I'd rather discuss fun and creative ideas to give something to BLM rather than waste time doing exactly this, arguing about what pithy types it should have, it's about as useless as trying to shovel snow in a blizzard.

Look more carefully at what I said, I do consider both sides. I don't necessarily think Raise is the right way to go but if the bottom line ends up being they need it for people to enjoy playing BLM versus just keeping them sad because lore then I'm going to put my chips on the let them play the damn game how they'd like side. Now I sincerely doubt it'll hit that point, if we look at Summoners current state and SE's history of overbuffing I'm sure BLM will be quite fine. Please please please please don't engage me on a "is lore important or not?" type discussion.

I wasn't prickly toward you, I was direct. I'm prickly toward Llugen. Sorry that it can sometimes be hard to tell. I'm like that sometimes.

I skimmed over your points because I agree mostly with them. I just don't think a Raise variant is a helpful idea to push, to put it lightly, and there are gameplay reasons for that as well that I've already pointed out. I'd sooner fix what black mage is supposed to do than give it more tools to not do the one thing it's meant to do. That's literally it. You agree lore is important, and you're trying to come up with ideas. In short, Prism, you are fine. Quit worrying.

Now, I could bring up a ton of lore (again) to show why black mages shouldn't get a Raise variant, but since certain people (Llugen) really don't give a fig for so huge a reason why this game is worth playing, I'd like to quote from a thread EllieShadeflare made.

• The Enochian Economy: Enochian... just doesn't work. It hasn't worked since 3.x, but 4.x solved half of the problem but causing new ones. Foul is essentially a return to all the problems associated with the original Enochian but now with the stipulation that A. Enochian now has an indefinite duration if done right and B. Enochian is easier to lose. Enochian is easier to lose due to the design of Fire IV and Astral Fire, since Fire IV does not refresh Astral Fire but both Fire IV and Enochian require Astral Fire or Umbral Ice in order to build up Foul. Actually, this is the old Enochian mechanic, with a "reward," a lack of degenerating duration and actually being easier to lose... Somehow, Black Mage became more complex in the team's attempt to not make the game more complex. Hm.
  
• Gambler or Black Mage? Two of Black Mage's most important tools, Firestarter and Thundercloud, are locked behind RNG. Firestarter to some might not be so bad, since it's just a Fire III you get randomly (or by using Sharpcast) on Fire. However, its purpose to a Black Mage belies its simple usage, as it's neccessary to extend Astral Fire when doing the opener, or moving. Having it as RNG is honestly a massive hindrance to the class. Thundercloud is borderline unacceptable, however. This is our third highest single target spell and it's locked behind RNG. Granted, this is also a problem with Bard and Refugulent Arrow and Pitch Perfect, and both should be solved.
  
• "Where's the Kaboom? There's supposed to be an earthshattering Kaboom!" A long time ago, Black Mage had damage without peer. Our raw potencies when merged with Astral Fire beat out Fell Cleave as a standard rotation spell. Unfortunately, this all changed with the changes to Stormblood. We lost Raging Strikes, a whopping 20% damage boost for 20s and Fire IV reduced to 260 potency. It seemed that the only way to make up this loss in potency would be with Foul... if the game didn't make it also disappointing with only 650 potency. Sure, we gained 14 potency per second... but that's still a pretty low improvement, and especially considering it took 10 levels just to get there. Compare this to other classes, who have gained net gains (such as the Tanks, who have either gained a powerful 'Fell Cleave' equivalent (Holy Spirit and Bloodspiller) or have gained a better economy (Beast Gauge and Inner Release), Healers who all gain a new tool for their healing, damage and support, and every other DPS other than MAYBE Monk who all feel objectively more powerful at 70 than at 60. With that also said, unlike other DPSes, even though our rotation is "simple" on paper, it's also rather... forceful in its tunnel vision.

So, what would be some solutions I'd suggest? Not all of the solutions need to be taken, but something has to be done.

• Fire IV Solution A: Increase Fire IV and Blizzard IV potency to 300. Why? We lost an incredible amount of damage, so much so that all it'd take to make Black Mage close to its old potency is to give us back our old potency. Buuuuut. Even old Black Mage had problems in 3.x and we also lost Raging Strikes on top of that. As a result, 300 should allow Black Mage to inflict serious hurt without being too deeply hampered by death or losing Enochian... and would make it almost match what we had when we used Raging Strikes due to the change to Enochian. If Black Mage is gonna commit to being a turret with seriously high damage, then we go full hog.
• Fire IV Solution B: Decrease cast time for Fire IV to 2.5s. If this is done instead of A, this would solve the problem of lining Fire IV with Enochian, while also solving our mobility issue. It'd especially work well with the reduction of RNG.
• Reduce the RNG. The insulting part is that it was already done for PVP, through Thunder III ready. Essentially, you build up Thunder III Ready by inflicting 5000 damage upon a foe whilst under the affect of Thunder. Then, perhaps for Firestarter, we can create a new mechanic, Astral Hearts, that works under a similar principle. With each cast of Fire IV, you gain an Astral Heart, and upon gaining 3, you guarantee Firestarter upon casting of Fire. In addition, each Astral Heart buffs the potency of Fire, with 1 Astral Heart making it 200, 2 Astral Hearts making it 220, and 3 making it 240. Thundercloud can also work under the same mechanic, through Aether Static. Each tic of Thunder I/II/III/IV causes your Aether Static to go up. I/III will make it go up by 15% per tic, whilst each tic of Thunder II/IV would make the gauge go up by 5%. Upon reaching full Aether Static, this is when you proc Thundercloud, which would no longer have a time limit to casting. However, RNG could still be there but would not affect Aether Static nor Astral Hearts... though Sharpcast would need a new purpose. Or replacement.
• Grant some mitigation or mobility. For the former, Quadcast (Triplecast + Swiftcast) does some of the work, but due to the way Fire IV works, it works more as a pseudo haste than as a true mobility. As such, a solution granted by the Black Mage thread gives this:
  
  While Quadcast may still be neccessary for the opener, IPZI would mitigate its neccessity for it in further procs of Leylines until you get Convert again.
  
  If mobility is not in the question, give us better mitigation. Lower the cooldown of Manaward. Done. Maybe give us a damage taken reduction cooldown? I'unno.

[Remedi]

I mean, that's exactly what I'm getting at. I'm not sure why everyone's trying to pull the "homogenization" card on BLM Raise when it's very clear that there are loads of other things that are pretty well "homogenized".

If that's so then it's better not to conitnue further down that way, though what was used as an example is not really what I would call homogenization since it fall in the required toolkit for the job and they do not really have an impact on the balance in a manner as big as something else.

[Llugen]

Here's the deal though, Cyn. It's already "unjustly spread." And keeping it off of BLM is only making the situation worse because it means BLMs shunned out.

Not sure if you read my post about my experience in unending the other night, but it's going to take a LOT of "raw damage" to compete with SMN, where in Nael phase I was able to get off FOUR full raises (two swift two slow) and maintain top damage on the boss (the DRG and the BRD both died and both healers), and still almost make it to enrage (we died to the last thermionic beam because not enough bodies)



Frankly, NO amount of "raw damage" can compete with that, and that's the problem I've been trying to illustrate in this thread. This game is a team effort especially at the high end, and when your caster choice(s) are either "play BLM for 'the damage' when you could have taken SAM for 'the damage' anyway, or play SMN/RDM for decent damage AND access to recovery", it's pretty obvious which choice is more alluring.


This is why it either deserves a nerf across the role, or BLM deserves access to it (the title of the thread). I think we have a better shot at the latter as a community trying to express issues with balance to the developers.


Frankly still, if they do some completely left-field blanket fix like "oh ok well here's Resurrection in the role pool! You're welcome!" Literally ALL of us are going to collectively facepalm. This is all part of why this is such a touchy (and heated) subject.