What Weapon Should A Blue Mage Use?

[Claire_Pendragon]

We have more chances of seeing these classes before a blue mage:

Someone hasnt seen the leaked datamining about BlueMageActions files.

go get the Mithra minion and come back after reading its descriptor and tell me that again, not to mention Ivalice storyline, at the very least it's a amalgam of various worlds.

Its a bit more complex than that even. (And the complexity has no lore based explanation, only a real world one)

For example, (warning, I might be misremembering which titles these were, but i think these were the right titles.)
The creation of FFX was based on the idea of being a distant future of FF7. So FF7 is losely a prequel from the perspective of FF10.
But from the perspective from FF7, FF10 is not a sequel to FF7.

This is because they are made by different creators.
FF10s writer thinks of it as a sequel, despite the FF7 writers not thinking of it as such.

Yoshida brought this up, as an example, because he feels similar, and went ahead with this kind of thinking acknowledging that its not really "canon", but sort of is in his mind, but only partially.
There is a lose connection to the IDEA of what the other FFs are, but they arent ACTUALLY, as is, the past of FF14.
Ivalice isnt actually the past, but at the same time it is.
But a near identical Ivalice, that isnt the same Ivalice, despite having some identical features.

This way, anything FF14 does, doesnt ruin any plans SE has, for what they plan to do with Ivalice outside of FF14, and any plans SE has for ivalice, cant change FF14.

[Kazrah]

I'm not going to talk about your supposed experience with gunblades though, since you have not posted anything that can in any way be responded to. No photo, no information on what they were (replica, museum exhibits, 'fan-made' gunblades, professional blacksmiths products etc.).

Mostly rapiers and sabers with small guns attached to them. The closest thing to something sensible was made by a professional blacksmith who worked at the Shakespearian festival where I live, and it kinda looked close to a shortened version of the long and thin gunblades used by a couple of Garlean NPCs (Gaius and later Nero), complete with a revolver chamber and a hollowed-out, single-edged blade for the gun barrel. I was told not to actually fire it because the last guy to try that broke a finger doing it, but you were supposed to fire it over your arm or some other rest for the blade/barrel. The blade itself was also pretty flimsy compared to similar swords; something about more weight would risk a couple of the gun components breaking on swing. So yes, while a gunblade is possible, there are some annoying limitations as to how you could make and wield the thing.

Also, while they may look like greatswords at a glance, zweihanders are NOT greatswords since there's usually about a foot of length difference between the two. I know, Dark Knight weapons needed to encompass a few types of bigger blades and zweihanders would indeed fall into that category, but because the zweihander style is suited to zweihanders rather than swords roughly a foot shorter than the typical greatsword, it leads to Dark Knights looking a bit awkward at times during the basic battle stance when holding bigger blades. It just seems like a case of devs making due with using what real-life inspirations that could be found.

[LineageRazor]

While I'm not fond of gunblades, I have to agree that the Main Scenario seems to be pointing toward Garlemand as being the setting for the next expansion, and given the popularity of the weapon it's not hard to imagine it will wind up in the hands of one of the new jobs. I could totally see BLU being the new Gunblade user. A big question in my mind, however, is how would the BLU use it? Would the BLU be a caster job, and only occasionally move in for melee (like RDM)? Or will it be closer in style to a melee job, staying up front full-time, and mixing in monster attacks with melee swings? And in the latter case, how would the "gun" part of the gunblade work into it?

Scimitar is another strong possiblity, and also one I'd rather avoid since we have plenty of sword-wielding jobs as it is. (Plus, PLD/GLD already has several scimitars in its arsenal.)

So, if those are two things I'd rather not see, what would I LIKE to see? I think I'd prefer BLU to be a melee-type job rather than a ranged caster. I wouldn't mind it getting a weapon never used by BLU before (just as SMN got books - a weapon they've not had before, to my knowledge). Perhaps they could be a quarterstaff fighter.

I personally don't want to see BLUEMAGE in FFXIV I don't think it would fit correctly with the idea of the core of what BLUE MAGE is. Sure they have completely reworked some of the jobs but at there core they all week there main trait. BLUE main trait would be limited with there a summoner with only 3 summons.

There would be no learning mechanitic from mobs. And Ability list would be so limited it wouldn't be worth it. LOOK at FFXI 100+ abilties but you can only use X amount at a time. And inturn ENDGAME becomes do you have these 20 abilities. NO GO AWAY.
BLUEMAGE at it's core don't work in MMOs vs stand alone games because in stand alone games you get to play the way you want to more vs what is the best way to play.

Different individuals have different ideas about what constitutes the core of Blue Mage. The example you gave, FFXI's take on the job, is VERY different from pretty much every other Blue Mage in the series. No other Blue Mage had hundreds of abilities, and there's no good reason for them to. No other BLU in the franchise featured only a CHANCE to learn the spell if you executed the learning process properly. FFXI BLU might be a job that you loved, but as you said yourself, it would be impossible to implement that way in FFXIV. Does that mean that it's pointless to implement BLU at all? Of course not. It will change to fit FFXIV, just like every other job has changed to fit FFXIV.

Would learning spells be impossible? It depends on what you insist constitutes learning. If you're going to insist that they only way learning should be implemented is by fighting random monsters until they use the ability, that is your opinion - and it flies in the face of some other Blue Mages in the franchise, such as Quistis (who consumed items to learn the magic, and never had to fight the monsters herself) or Khimari and Quina (who did have to fight the mobs, but never needed them to use the ability). There's no single way that learning blue magic MUST be implemented.

As for the concern of BLUs being locked out of content for not learning the correct spells, why not have them learn the spells during job quests? That way, a BLU would be no worse off than any other job would that neglected their job quests. The job quest could be something simple like, "Find a Marlboro, and pester it until you see it use Bad Breath," or if you want to get fancy, "The Amal'ja are summoning Ifrit! Put the primal down - and see if you can learn anything from it in the process." (Revisit Ifrit (Hard) in the duty finder to learn Vulcan Burst.)

There are VERY few traits that are common to ALL Blue Mages across the series. Some of them don't even wear blue (Quistis, Quina, Strago - well, I guess Strago's pants have some blue in them...)! Really, as long as you have a class that uses monster abilities without turning into a monster to do so, you've got a Blue Mage. If that's the only core of a Blue Mage, FFXIV has a lot of room to work with!

[MicahZerrshia]

And I'm saying, and still standing by, that it's entirely possible to make proper gunblades. It's just not going to be as straightforward as making a gun or a sword.

In a video game yes, its quite easy.

irl though a gunblade comes with all kinds of issues. Like weight, unwieldiness, balance issues, misfires, loading difficulties, grip issues, etc. both as a gun or a sword.

As a gun a sword would weigh the barrel down and make it harder to point and shoot with any semblance of accuracy unless you are willing to take the chance of cutting yourself by holding the blade while it kickbacks from the fire and you couldn't even do this without shooting your fingers off unless the barrel was the entire length of the sword. There are issues with parrying, as in if your opponent is close enough you could not shoot anyway and if you tried they could easy slap away the blade making you fire to the side and loose your advantage. And its just entirely off balance, even poorly balanced swords would be better off than all the extra weight a gun would add and the placement of that weight also adds to the balance issues. You also have the misfires, are you willing to whip a loaded gun around and then slam it against a wall? The chance of random shots is huge and a safety risk that isn't worth it. And that is just the tip of the iceberg. Finally lets look at them practical, its much easier to have a sword in one hand and a gun in the other if you really need both

Just talk to a weapons expert sometime. It's a common question they get and I have heard them respond many times about. They will tell you almost across the board, that it may look good but in actual battle they would put you at a huge disadvantage and come with way to many safety concerns. If gunblades were a good idea we would see tons more of them. But they are not which is why we have bayonets instead.

[Jandor]

Real life Gunblades weren't especially practical but they weren't completely bad either, it might have been neither the best possible sword nor the best possible gun, but they could still be used to stab and shoot people if you needed to.

Still, it was more of a fashion choice than anything else, once wealthy officers realized that a good regular gun and a good normal sword were a much better use of their money they fell out of fashion and pretty much disappeared.



The Gun-axe was more useful by most accounts, not really any worse than a normal axe when used as such and not bad as a pistol either.





Dual wielding Gun Axes for Blue Mage please!

[MomomiMomi]

For example, (warning, I might be misremembering which titles these were, but i think these were the right titles.)
The creation of FFX was based on the idea of being a distant future of FF7. So FF7 is losely a prequel from the perspective of FF10.
But from the perspective from FF7, FF10 is not a sequel to FF7.

This is because they are made by different creators.
FF10s writer thinks of it as a sequel, despite the FF7 writers not thinking of it as such.

But Return to Ivalice was created by Yasumi Matsuno, creator of Ivalice. What now?

[Claire_Pendragon]

But Return to Ivalice was created by Yasumi Matsuno, creator of Ivalice. What now?

You quoted the part about FFX and FFVII.

On a side note, Yoshida already established the connection of Ivalice, but they brought him on, so that the details would be fleshed out in the 24man content so it would give off a more authentic Ivalice feel.
And remember, the creators themselves said its not the actual Ivalice of prior games, when it comes to making future ivalice games, they wont say "FF14 was its future". But it IS the past to FF14, with something like 80-90% of Ivalice happened.

[Lubu_Mykono]

An extendable mace and off-handshield. Why?

1. Some ranged possibilities like a whip
2. Blunt Damage
3. Off hand that actually uses some kind of counter / magic counter which what blue magic is.

[MomomiMomi]

You quoted the part about FFX and FFVII.

Yes I did. But if your reasoning is that it's because they aren't the same creators, then what is your reasoning when they ARE the same creators, as is the case with Return to Ivalice?

It seems to me you either need to find a new reason to explain why it doesn't hold true for FF7, or accept that it can hold true in the case of Return to Ivalice; unless if you have another explanation.


Also, if they specifically said that's the case for Ivalice, can you please share where they said that? I haven't seen it, but would definitely like to.

EDIT: Found Yasumi Matsuno saying it. Still, my point in the previous post was that the reasoning is flawed.

[Claire_Pendragon]

Yes I did. But if your reasoning is that it's because they aren't the same creators, then what is your reasoning when they ARE the same creators, as is the case with Return to Ivalice?

I brought that example up, to over simplify it, but the core concept still generally remains, but with the added detail that Yasumi came in after the original concept was thought up.
Yoshida was like "Lets do an Ivalice themed 24man!" and then he was like "Lets get Yasumi to make it more authentic feeling!"
Its a FF14 gift/box, but with Ivalice Wrapping paper.

But for that example to fully make sense, I gave the prior example to help flesh out why the "wrapping paper" doesnt equal FF14s Ivalice is based on the FFT/12 Ivalice, but what happens in FF14 doesnt happen in FFT/FF12s future. (People, who arent the original creators, make sequels to storys they didnt originally make. The creator isnt the sole issue, but its part of the issue, a contributing factor.)
Its a one sided thing.

(I think my wording wasnt well thought out, as I can see how it looks like I'm phrasing it so it seems im saying its the sole reason, rather than one of the primary reasons)