A question for the BLU peeps

[Tlachtga]

Blue Mage is horribly imbalanced in most games. In V, it can cheese a lot of bosses that other jobs would have to fight the fair way. In VII, it gives access to more powerful spells than most materias, for cheaper and far earlier, and in IX, with the proper setup, it allows Quina to hit damage cap from the very beginning.

The only games where Blue Magic could arguably be balanced are the two that considered it so powerful that they were used as Limit Break.

"most games" = 3 games.
"horribly imbalanced" = requiring extremely specific setups.

Okay lol

But let's be real, you can break those games in all kinds of other ways with non-enemy skills. In that sense, blue magic is "balanced" in those games, in that everything is equally broken.

^this

[Reynhart]

Building up BLU gauge in order to use big BLU attacks seems a very reasonable way to adapt BLU to FFXIV.

Sure, it could, but if the goal is simply to prevent casting the most powerfull spells each turn, you could simply give them a cooldown.

But, I wonder what cooldown you'd have to give to a skill like Blaster or Doom Claw, that will only leave the target with a pitiful amount, to keep BLU balanced with other jobs. I could see a solution for really powerful spell, by having spells that requires channeling. Which means that BLU would have to stand still and stay alive for a "long" period of time in order for the spell to connect.

"most games" = 3 games.

3 games over 5 where Blue Mage is not a limited mechanic...that's the definition of "most", yes. And even in XI, even if not broken, BLU is far from balanced. But I'm sure 1 game (FF VI) is a valid candidate for :

But BLU magic has been balanced in every game to date.

"horribly imbalanced" = requiring extremely specific setups.

Right "Let Quina die and ue a Phoenix Down so that s/he comes back with 1 HP" is so much "extreme"...

But let's be real, you can break those games in all kinds of other ways with non-enemy skills. In that sense, blue magic is "balanced" in those games, in that everything is equally broken.

Sure you can, but other setup are obtained later or requires far more preparation.
In FFV, you can break the game by mastering Ninja, leveling Samurai, Sorcerer and Black Mage to do RapidFire + Spellsword + Flare or...you by being a Blue Mage with Doom Claw.
In FFVII, you can learn Beta right after Kalm and it will be your most powerful throughout the first disc and even after that, it's a really powerful spell. You can learn White Wind halfwaf right after Gold Saucer and use it at your only healing/curing status spell until the very end of the game.
In FFIX, Zidane can hit damage cap by stealing hundreds of time and having capped speed, Freya can hit damage cap by killing 100 dragons and having the best spear in the game. Quina can hit damage cap...by having 1 HP, without requiring any item to learn the skill...from the very beginning of the game.

[Jandor]

Sure, it could, but if the goal is simply to prevent casting the most powerfull spells each turn, you could simply give them a cooldown.

But, I wonder what cooldown you'd have to give to a skill like Blaster or Doom Claw, that will only leave the target with a pitiful amount, to keep BLU balanced with other jobs. I could see a solution for really powerful spell, by having spells that requires channeling. Which means that BLU would have to stand still and stay alive for a "long" period of time in order for the spell to connect.

That could be pretty cool to be honest.

Planting your weapon into the ground and channeling blue magic into it to form an aetheric monster that uses its signature ability on the enemy.

[Reynhart]

Planting your weapon into the ground and channeling blue magic into it to form an aetheric monster that uses its signature ability on the enemy.

I imagined that "xxxx needles" could do 1000 damage x your level over the course of your whole MP bar. The speed of which MP are spent could be tweaked to obtain the desired DPS number.

And it's a good example of how the current status of BLU won't automatically stay the same throughout the whole game. At level 1, 1000 needles is absolutely overpowered when other jobs deal less than 50, at level 50, 50 000 needles is still completely broken...but, at level 80, having a skill do 80k during a specific period of time at the cost of standing still is not that big of a problem when some skills already do around 20k or more.

[Tlachtga]

Right "Let Quina die and ue a Phoenix Down so that s/he comes back with 1 HP" is so much "extreme"...

It might not be hard, but its still a specific setup. Leaving characters at 1hp isn't normal gameplay in an FF game.

I notice you mentioned FF6, but out of curiosity, what is your opinion on Quistis' Blue Magic in FF8? Would you say that its OP?

[Reynhart]

It might not be hard, but its still a specific setup. Leaving characters at 1hp isn't normal gameplay in an FF game.

When you have a skill that specifically does 9999 damage if you have 1 HP, it's not that abnormal to create a setup where Quina has 1 HP. Likewise, if you have a spell that kills any target with a level multiple of 5 and a skils that changes the enemy's level, it's easy to connect the dots in FFV.

I notice you mentioned FF6, but out of curiosity, what is your opinion on Quistis' Blue Magic in FF8? Would you say that its OP?

In FFVIII (And X, for the record), all limits are overpowered, so Quistis/Khimari having Blue Magic is not the most absurd part of the game.

If you don't exploit the "keep low HP so that you can use a limit break each turn", having White Wind fully healing Quistis and the rest of the party means that every time she runs low on HP, she can heal everyone to full for free. And you can equip Darkside to make sure she's the one to lose HP the fastest.

[Kurando]

snip

I wanted to add that in FFVIII reducing your HP to use limits wasn't really necessary as the spell Aura allowed characters to always be in a LB stance even at full HP, they just had to refresh the menu several times till the arrow appeared.

[Melichoir]

But BLU magic has been balanced in every game to date. FFXIV would be no different.

It's been balanced in every game to an extent, usually being one of the strongest classes you can play. Furthermore, the model of it is based on SINGLE PLAYER PLAY typically. FFXI is the only exception to this. After reading about BLU from FFXI, it wouldnt work in FFXIV due to some differences in how their combat system and FFXIVs works. Broadly, FFXIs combat and job system is far more nuanced than FFXIVs. The level of nuance provided by FFXIs system allowed fro the class to exist (and it was still seen as being on the upper ends of power, at least for a while in comparison to other classes). That nuance doesnt exist in FFXIV, making balancing within OUR combat system a lot more difficult and more likely to skew towards OP status. It worked in FFXI due to a huge amount of factors and complexity not found here. This makes BLU in FFXI an exception, not proof, that it could be balanced in FFXIV. It would only become proof IF you decided to concede that more complexity needs to be added into our combat system.

The TLDR based on what I read was simply this: BLU mage worked because the game systems within FFXI helped keep it balanced. Those systems dont exist in FFXIV, thus you cant 'import' BLU as a concept from FFXI.



In regards to some of the suggestions, they all boil down to the same issue: It shifts power and focus away from Monster skills in favor of the new system. Lets say you put heavy CDs on monster skills. Thta means there gonna be filler or a rotation instead. If you use Skill A, you then go to Skill B, then to Skill C, then back to Skill A (depending CD length). This creates a rotation system and cuts against the concept of "Learn any skill any time." and more into there will be a 'correct path' of skill progression. This makes learning monster skills just a more convoluted version of NPC quests every so many levels (and this still doesnt balance for getting skills "out of order" unless the game prevents you from doing so.) Even in FFXI, there was a skill path to some extent.

If you put it on a resource system (that is to say build up so much energy or what have you before using skill), then the monster skills become mini limit breaks and the core focus of the class is the skills and play style used in between monster skills. Those 'filler' skills wont be monster skills themselves in this case because that would still subsequently fall into the same issue Ive outlined before (Nerfing skills and then introducing a new playstyle to compensate). But instead of all the monster skills, now its just most. All of this, by the way, revolves around changing the playstyle (and subsequently the identity) of BLU away from "Learning monster skills" to "A class that uses skills whos job quest was just grinding monsters." Even in FFXI, they handled monster skills as your bread and butter, not mini LBs along with doing Melee Combat.

Again, Im not seeing this issue be resolved.

[Tlachtga]

All of this, by the way, revolves around changing the playstyle (and subsequently the identity) of BLU away from "Learning monster skills" to "A class that uses skills whos job quest was just grinding monsters."

Blue mage was never about learning the spells. It's about using them.

Learning spells is just means to an end.

Again, Im not seeing this issue be resolved.

What issue? Some nonsense about how Blue Mage isn't Blue Mage if its not overpowered?

[Reinha]

The issue here is you'd need to create to combat systems for one class. They would literally need to design 2 classes and then roll it into one.

Nope. A mishmash of unbalanced monster skills that don't form a coherent rotation and can't be used in any relevant content does not count as a class/job. (That's the bloody issue!) They would, in my example, literally design one full job including job quests plus some disconnected skills for the side content they have planned. Bard is not two classes in one just because they have Perform skills.

This then also then opens up the question of "Why not do this for every class?". You'll see more fracturing in the player base as a result, I believe. From a purely design perspective, while possible, this solution isnt financially feasible unless the goal is to introduce less classes overall.

Why? Because Limited Jobs were a bad idea to begin with and any suggestions to fix it are aimed to not make things worse than they have to be. I know the devs have a tendency to stubbornly ride their mistakes to the bitter end (Diadem) but that's really not necessary. I don't believe that getting the best possible outcome for Blue Mage will spark jealousy in those who play other jobs, because Conjurers got their mount quest and Bards got their Perform system without any such controversy.

The stronger the skill, the greater the 'shackle' will be on that skill. A skill like "Bad Breath" would likely have a 5-6 minute cooldown on it for its power and would force it to be heavily situational. This changes the focus from those monster skills to whatever filler skill you have, and then revolves around the playstyle around that filler skill. You'd end up with a more homogenized class that has mini limit breaks every few minutes. Itd be different, yes. But playstyle wouldn't revolve around those monster skills.

Situational stuff was part of the BLU identity, was it not? The player using Bad Breath rarely could also be achieved by giving it a resource cost that makes it worthwhile only in AoE cleave situations. For single target you'd use some other monster skill. And another skill for sustained multi-target, etc. The filler skills would also be learned from monsters so I don't see the problem. If I go in the open world and fight regular monsters of my level, the skills they use are often quite unimpressive and would be perfect as fillers without any nerfing.

Tbh, implying that BLU must be overpowered in order to be "true BLU" and dismissing any counter examples as "not true BLU" pretty much fits the definition of the No True Scotsman fallacy. The only things that actually seem to define a BLU are that 1) they can learn skills from monsters and 2) they fight using skills learned from monsters (Blue Magic).

Blue Mages, as their name implies, focus on Blue Magic, a special subset of Magic that allows them to use attacks otherwise exclusive to enemies. While an odd choice, Blue Mages often have a wide range of usefulness due to the varied spells they gain. Blue Mages usually learn Blue Magic by having enemies (or occasionally, another Blue Mage ally) use it on them, but some games have other methods to learn their magic. http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Blue_Mage

Blue Magic (青魔法, Ao Mahō?), also referred to as Blu Mag, Enemy Skill, Blue Bullet, Ronso Rage, Lore or Blue, is a skillset consisting of abilities used by monsters. Most of the time, a character who can use it is known as a Blue Mage. It first appeared in Final Fantasy V and was a staple in the main series until Final Fantasy XII. The exact method of learning Blue Magic has varied, but all involve the magic being learned from enemies. http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Blue_Magic