Blue Mage is a masterpiece of game design.

[Liam_Harper]

Maybe BLU would do the amazing overpowered damage to bring primals down on his own if we got an actual weapon he could scale with instead of this really vague 'scales better with intelligence' bs.

This is something I don't get. Why was it necessary that Blu's weapon has no stats?

Blu's standard dps is currently dreadful, worse than a regular lv50 caster and that's with band-aids like a permamently sustainable ST 50% damage buff and a 50% damage trait. Obviously Blu's lack of weapon had to be heavily compensated for and even then Blu is still lacking in lv50 content. So... why couldn't they just give Blu a regular weapon instead of a walking stick?

[ksuyen]

Original BLU has a lot more spells to learn that are not in the current patch. How about Magick Hammer, Matra Magic, White Wind (heal) or Angel Whisper (heal)?

[Vaer]

This is something I don't get. Why was it necessary that Blu's weapon has no stats?

Blu's standard dps is currently dreadful, worse than a regular lv50 caster and that's with band-aids like a permamently sustainable ST 50% damage buff and a 50% damage trait. Obviously Blu's lack of weapon had to be heavily compensated for and even then Blu is still lacking in lv50 content. So... why couldn't they just give Blu a regular weapon instead of a walking stick?

I thought about this, too. The only real purpose it serves is at least you can auto attack weaker things to learn their abilities (at lvl50, cane smack still does like 13 dmg) but then again you also have tail screw. TBH A simpler explanation is they didn't want to bother to design more weapons, less design work for the artists and modelers. They have some new job weapons to make, and all the new ones for existing jobs. They cut a lot of corners for BLU.

The only thing I remember them saying is they didn't want BLU to have to get weapons from dungeons when they can't actually join them easily in the first place but seems like a flimsy explanation when they could have just been awarded from quests/crafted or from the carnivale.

Who knows though.

[Elkanah]

This is something I don't get. Why was it necessary that Blu's weapon has no stats?

Blu's standard dps is currently dreadful, worse than a regular lv50 caster and that's with band-aids like a permamently sustainable ST 50% damage buff and a 50% damage trait. Obviously Blu's lack of weapon had to be heavily compensated for and even then Blu is still lacking in lv50 content. So... why couldn't they just give Blu a regular weapon instead of a walking stick?

Can we just get Treasure hunter skill on the BLU weapon level 1, 50 and the final azuro version? Cause that seems much more legit to me than the rng garbage from primals at this point.

[Reynhart]

I agree that stagnation is a major issue though, but I think the best way to solve that would be to have a massive influx of fresh content released at a quicker pace.

Unless you include some random elements into your content (Random dungeon layout, non scripted fights, random bosses, etc...) or allow some player driven content, nothing can stay fresh until the dev team is ready to release the next content. Timsesinks give you a goal, something to do when you wait for the next patch. What could be a problem with XIV's timesink is when it takes longer to get a reward than the time you'll actually use it, because gear is replaced too fast.

The problem I see with BLU is how people went from the get go to the "How to level to 50 in the fastest way possible". Why ? What's the rush ? Why do you go to such extent as leveling BLU by...not playing BLU but instead use an exploit with you high level job or being power leveled. Yesterday, I learned lvl5 Petrify by going into Haukke with one friend. I was lvl28, he was lvl30, and we struggled a little but it was more fun than going there as two lvl50 BLU wrecking everything or watching Netflix while we only wait for the spell to "drop".

Yeah, i'm just asking FFXIV to do what any good game, critically acclaimed, would do. To focus on gameplay instead of time sinking and obstuce mechanics.

Quite bold to say that when the "difficulty" of FFXIV only comes from "The first time this mechanic is introduced, it will kill you because you won't understand it".

Following a Zerg and doing FATEs is now social.

Talking is social. Something almost no one does in matchmaking apart from a random {Hello} and {Congrratulations}

For me social is when you have to discuss a strategy with your party in order to tackle a boss, or form a organization with mindlike goals

Yeah, it's called "leading the train" or "coordinating your with other parties to spawn different NMs"

Not following other 90 players that might aswell be NPCs for all you care.

You simply describe someone brooding in his corner during a brainstorming. That's not the brainstorming fault.

The whole genre was founded with that line of thought, and look where it is now as a genre...

Well, XIV is pretty shallow in its timesinks and it's at a point where some people sub only for one month, and then unsub until the next big patch, and don't miss any valuable item. Which is what I might do comes Shadowbringers...

I think the game needs both.

Yes, both. Because challenge is not the only good incentive. I never said is wasn't not a good one.

[BillyKaplan]

They cut a lot of corners for BLU.

Which is funny when you think about it because in order to accommodate the no-WD mechanic, they had to have basically remade the job compared to the existing system. I guess the people working on that had more free time than the people designing weapons.

[Elerus]

Why ? What's the rush ? Why do you go to such extent as leveling BLU by...not playing BLU.

I can only speak for myself, but here's my personal take:

I enjoy strategy games. The vast majority of my gaming library are strategy games. Turn-based (Warhammer Total War, Endless Space II, Dominions, etc.), Grand Strategy (Crusader Kings II, Victoria II), and even some real time (mostly Dawn of War I and II). It's ingrained in me to find optimizations and push systems. I often don't ask if something can be done - that's relatively easy to figure out - I ask how efficiently and powerfully I can execute on a design. It's fun to me, accelerating strategies, plotting builds, and obtaining an edge. It's how I play FF. Before Blue Mage was even released I had looked up guides for spell locations, I had gear prepared (and consumables), etc. While I was and am deeply disappointed in the limited job restriction I was determined to make the most out of it and dive into the content. It's the primary reason I advocate for the expansion and lifting of Blue Mage so that I can enjoy it like I enjoy the other content in this game. I'm not saying my way of playing is superior and I certainly imagine some people would find it boring, but it is how I personally have fun in and out of FFXIV when it comes to video games.

I also imagine I'm not the only person who approaches content in such a fashion so . . . that probably accounts for at least a few answers to the why in your statement. Others will, of course, have to speak for themselves.

[Burningskull]

This is something I don't get. Why was it necessary that Blu's weapon has no stats?

Blu's standard dps is currently dreadful, worse than a regular lv50 caster and that's with band-aids like a permamently sustainable ST 50% damage buff and a 50% damage trait. Obviously Blu's lack of weapon had to be heavily compensated for and even then Blu is still lacking in lv50 content. So... why couldn't they just give Blu a regular weapon instead of a walking stick?

Having Blu's weapon being useless and increasing how much magic power comes from intellect means they don't have to make a lot of weapons for levels 1 - 50. Just your starting weapon, the lvl 50 one, and w/e the Carvnival weapon is.

[DarkDedede]

I could do with a few more glamour options for the blue mage weapons. Personally, I was looking forward to the a moogle variant, and I'm not even a fan of the aura weapons.

Hopefully we'll get some primal variety blue mage weapons, especially since a handful of skills are obtained from the primal fights.

[xbahax92]

Its not the first time that SE releases half-baked content
Im sure you all remember when they released the squadron system. It was such a minor Feature during its first release, all you could do is recruit your members and change their classes and send them out for leveling.
After a few patches they added also the glamouring option, to be able to run certain dungeons with them and also more Grand company promotions.
At the moment blue mage feels the same like this, he has nothing to offer and only serves one purpose, being another theme park element in an MMORPG.
I wouldnt be surprised if they decided to create only limited jobs after they notice "you have (soon) 17 jobs to pick, we are done with them, here take a limited job instead".