Quote Originally Posted by Zerathor View Post
You don't need a smn unless you're trying to pad your personal damage. As it stands right now, with only one caster in a party, blm is now competitive for tDPS with smn. Barely. Being that smn still has a raise and full mobility, it shouldn't even be this close but that's whatever. The point is if blm total potential decreases just a little in favor of making the job easier for people that don't play it often, it'll just go back to being a sub par choice to a smn in every aspect.

We're actually seeing blm in some speed kill comps again. Let's not lose this. Lowering the dps potential of the job to make it less unforgiving and maybe more mobile will just make it a worse smn that can't raise people.
It's not about needing or not needing a SMN. And in higher-level play, the emphasis isn't on your personal damage (pDPS), but on the damage you bring overall (tDPS). In that regard, BLM doesn't bring any more damage with a SMN than without; the SMN just brings more damage by virtue of their being a BLM, and does this best by using Contagion just before your first Fire IV every other elemental cycle and fitting its own flexibly timed damage into that same period of burst.

The thing holding back BLM is not SMN. A SMN wants a BLM so that it can better milk it's damage. What holds back BLM are (1) other jobs' codependence, such as DRG upon BRD and MCH, (2) the sheer power of Refresh which makes Ranged obligatory (and in turn DRG and in turn MCH), (3) burst phase window synergy (as Trick Attack can time damn well with MCH, SMN, SAM, and DRG -- not that BLM doesn't juice it well after first SpS breakpoint for 4 consecutive Fire IVs before needing to refresh AF without LL), and (5) its immobility, which gives SAM a pDPS lead and SMN (even as a single caster) a notable tDPS lead depending on the fight.

The Devs are already aware that DRG+Ranged is a problem, and is only going to get worse with each Piercing class so long as Disembowel remains as is. That leaves only a need for increased control by which to ensure one exploits (or is exploited by) their raid buffs as well as possible and by which to reduce loss of uptime even in fights that would seem able to uniquely cost you significant portions thereof. Add those and balance around it and the only negative effect is that you don't make SAM non-competitive in some fights, while you in turn remain a competitive choice in more fights.