Blue mage is a waste of potential, change my mind.

[Fyce]

Going into a level 16 dungeon to get a skill required for your level 20 job quest while level 50 doesn’t sound a tab bit bass-ackwards to you? Because it does to me. What’s even the point of soloing a level 16 dungeon at 50 when you can just poke a level 70 friend to steamroll it for you while you /follow?

Again, that doesn’t sound like the kind of solo play I had in mind. It’s certainly nothing different from what other combat jobs can already do (i.e., soloing any of the ARR or HW dungeons at level 70, or soloing overworld mobs). I expected a solo job to actually be able to do content solo that other jobs cannot, like doing at-level dungeons while near or at that level.

Why does it matter if I find it to be backwards that you need to go do dungeons unsync? It won't change the fact that you can still learn that skill solo. My personal opinion has very little to do with that.
Again, I never argued against your subjective opinion here. I simply quoted OP, who was saying that "24 out of 49 skills couldn't be obtained solo", to say that most of these could actually be obtained solo.

Can you go in Tam Tara with the unsync option and learn that skill? Of course you can! OP's "fact" was false. And I'm not being pedantic about one single skill... I'm talking about a dozen skills at least.
All I care is that people get their facts straight. Because if you don't, then SE will simply correct you in the next liveletter and assume that you "misunderstood" or you "didn't find alternatives to learn some of these skills".

Try to picture this: It's February, 2nd or 3rd, European Fan Festival is happening. There is a Q/A session. Kahuna (or any Community Manager) reads the question to Yoshida: "During the Las Vegas FanFest, you stated that Blue Mage was 'designed for solo play', but 25 skills can only be obtained by grouping! Why is that?". And then Yoshida answers...: "25 skills? The Blue Mage Grimoire just give you hints! Some of these skills can be obtained somewhere else! Also, you can use the undersize option to do dungeons alone."
And now everyone is disappointed and frustrated. Because the answer is technically correct, but don't answer what people actually want to ask for.
The end.

It's a sad story, right? Unfortunatly, it's not the first time that happened. And it won't be the last. This is why it's important that people get their facts straight, and understand exactly how they should formulate stuff.
Remember what happened when people asked for "harder raids"? That's what happen when you don't articulate your requests properly.

Square Enix is just like a bad genie. If you aren't careful with your wishes, something very wrong is likely to happen.

Yeah, they have to in their current implementation because they can’t get anything done otherwise. Either party up with all BLUs or grab a level 70 friend. Why can’t they do it solo?

Again, I was under the impression they would be capable of doing these things solo, and could choose to group up if they wanted to do so. I wasn’t under the impression that group play was required for the solo job. Especially since they insisted BLU couldn’t play with the other jobs on the playground because “OP”.

Well, if you want an objective, but disappointing answer as to "why can't they do it solo?", it's probably just a design decision. And again, I want to reiterate that I'm neither defending it or arguing against it.
And in regards to how you personally interpreted what was announced during the reveal, a lot of people also thought that there is no way it could solo everything... But I have to say that it doesn't matter. What matters is how the job actually plays, not a powerpoint presentation and how people interpreted it.

Arguing about what you thought SE meant in that presentation will actually achieve very little. Want me to do the sad story again? I'll make it quick:
Kahuna (or any Community Manager) reads the question to Yoshida: "A lot of people were under the impression that Blue Mage was going to be a solo job in regards to what you presented during the Las Vegas FanFestival...", and Yoshida answers: "Yeah, we understand the confusion. Sorry, we should've been more clear. That aside, The Masked Carnivale is solo! If you want solo content, go do that!"
And now everyone is disappointed [Blablabla].

So, not only people should get their facts straight, but they also should be mindful as to what exactly is relevant if they ever want SE to get back to them in a meaningful way.

Why shouldn’t you be able to take a supposedly “OP” and “broken” job — that, again, was too OP to balance for group play in “normal duties” — and completely break a fight solo? In my opinion, that would be fun. It’s not fun having to poke my friends for repeated ARR Ex primal runs just so I can hopefully get a skill. I’d love the opportunity to solo it as a level 50 BLU in my own time (and it not take 20 years). Far more fun than steamrolling a level 16 dungeon as a level 50 job.

There is a difference between “a level 50 soloing a level 50 Ex trial” and “a level 50 soloing a level 16 dungeon”. One has the potential to be exciting — breaking a fight sounds fun to me, anyways — but the other is just you steamrolling the same way your level 70 friend steamrolls.

If you find that idea of basically being the indestructible Superman quite fun, I guess that's fair and I completly respect you having the right to find that fun. But again, I personally (and here's my personal subjective opinion, wooo, finally something people can argue against while using their own) don't really understand why it'd be much different than soloing anything by playing as Lv.70. I can already "break" Ifrit's trial or Lv.50 dungeons by playing solo with pretty much any job. I don't really know what else could Blue Mage bring on the table. I mean, yeah, you can find that fun, but I'm not sure I would.

Besides (back to objective statements) it'd mean that BLU would never be able to reach the current max level (80 for Shadowbringers). It'd have to constantly be behind by 10 levels. Could you imagin if BLU could reach Lv.80 during Shadowbringers? "Nice weapon dude! When did your group cleared [insert whatever 8-man savage raid that Shadowbringers will have]?" - "Oh, I just did it alone with my BLU".
If they were to allow BLU to reach max level, they'd have to completly prevent BLU from getting any reward from current content if it could solo it. The amount of incentives to do whatever -except if a skill can be learned- would be quite small. Not a lot of people go in... I don't know, Snowcloak (?) with their Lv.70 just for the sake of soloing it. Or maybe that's just me who don't do that.