I think Square Enix and/or the DEVs hate mages! (Long post)

[charlemagne]

I can't think of an instance where a class hasn't needed some kind of rebalancing in an mmo. The simple fact is that devs can never entirely predict how a player base will choose to play it. Either the players will learn to work around this or at some point mp consumption or mp pool will be tweaked or some other ja will be introduced to compensate. Either way I think it's a little early to complain too much about it until we have a bit more practice adjusting to how the mage jobs are set up now.

[Lienn]

Right now mages are incomplete and unbalanced in several aspects...but they are raw in this new mechanics...

Probably they will be balanced after 1.21 since only then ppl will have the real feel of his mage classes/jobs.

[Black_Rose]

i wish mages would be more active in battles.
while DD's can spam their skills endlessly mages have to stop at some point to start resting MP.
i would love mages to have a lower mp cost on spells, and a bigger varity of magic to use during battle, so i don't just see our THM spam thunder and fire combos, but rather use high tier magics.

same goes for CNJ, he might be the White mage job like class, but i'd love to see more action by those classes aswell besides weak stone/aero skills and heals/buffs.something like dia, banish, holy etc etc.

i don't know i'm not the typical mage player, i just wish they'd be more active and have a bigger assortment of skills to use during fights that aren't totally useless.
this would make the total fight overall more enjoying, seeing big as ice crystals hitting the floor, or just some light spells blinding or damaging the enemies.FFXIV's magic just seems very weak in comparison to the offline series.
i guess jobs will give this a lil twist, but can't leave the classes as they are, might aswell remove them if they are doomed to be the boring ones in my opinion :X

[Estellios]

You really aren't a mage player then... I use every one of my CNJ abilities now on a frequent basis when before a large amount of them would never get used. Aero and Stone spells aren't weak at all either even when compared to THM nukes (which are justifiably more powerful). They probably just don't look that way since we have the lame old spell animations for now.

DD can't spam skills endlessly either because you still have to wait on the initial TP before you combo. Hell some people have complained about that @_@

Maybe the playstyles just aren't for you. I find CNJ to be extremely active if I do everything I can in a group.

[Tango]

Learn2mage

[Dreadnought]

I think your few months late for this discuaaion.

Anyway, MP cost as you can see, were so low before, it might as well been 0 to cast anything. Now there is a reguirement for MP management and strategy.

its funny to me that people think MP management is strategy at all. all you need to do is pace yourself and use your 1 free spell buff whenever applicable... thats strategy?
in other MMOs, even if i run out of MP there is a relatively quick way of getting it back.
the strategy comes with being a massive uber enmity magnet - i can either choose to nuke almost endlessly with a 99% chance of death/wipe or i can chain a handful of nukes to manage my enmity. in between chained nukes i do less powerful spells and rebuff myself. this keeps me very busy as a DD mage in other MMOs.
either way it keeps me busier longer because im not just standing around in between nukes and not required to heal anyone in the meantime (your magic DD should never have to do a healers job just as your melee shouldnt have to)

I just dont see extreme MP management as either fun nor strategic since all you do is pace your nukes, quite slowly at that.

[Black_Rose]

DD can't spam skills endlessly either because you still have to wait on the initial TP before you combo. Hell some people have complained about that @_@

Maybe the playstyles just aren't for you. I find CNJ to be extremely active if I do everything I can in a group.

TP being a problem? i haven't noticed that yet.ever since the combos got implemented i felt like i don't stop doing them at any time during fights x.x

i think i just miss the huge list of avaiable magic spells like in FFXI to choose from, i allways feel more comfortable with a bulk list of magic, even if i won't use 50% of them anymore once i hit a specific range of lvl XD.
like i said, compared with the offline series or FFXI, FFXIV seems really short on awsome magic to choose from, this is simply why i currently don't enjoy mages much, they don't feel very powerful to me (not in a sense of dmg dealing!)

i'm currently waiting for BLM to come, as i saw he will get the flare etc spells, hopefully with more powerful animations/effects, not the lame ones from before.
after all they also did a pretty good job on the new DoW weaponskill animations!
mage needs to be put more in the spotlight ^.^

[Dreadnought]

You really aren't a mage player then... I use every one of my CNJ abilities now on a frequent basis when before a large amount of them would never get used. Aero and Stone spells aren't weak at all either even when compared to THM nukes (which are justifiably more powerful). They probably just don't look that way since we have the lame old spell animations for now.

DD can't spam skills endlessly either because you still have to wait on the initial TP before you combo. Hell some people have complained about that @_@

Maybe the playstyles just aren't for you. I find CNJ to be extremely active if I do everything I can in a group.

CNJ is way more active because CNJ is much more viable in MP management. you can even equip sanguine rite for when your getting pummeled but THM cannot equip the CNJ MP ability which really doesnt make much sense to me.
CNJ can deliver a mass amount of damage over time especially if they are equipped correctly, they can almost rival the over all damage output of THM.
Why not give THM abilities and spells to keep them busy while they build up the large damage high MP costing high cooldown nukes? this would keep them busy in the mean while. and was Aspir too OP to have or something?
In WoW (go ahead and flame) my friend played a class (cant remember which) that allowed him to cast spells and abilities on the target that increased his damage, but it took a few spells and nukes to get there. he was constantly doing something it seemed. after a few seconds he was then practically a THM but with a few button pushes in between each nuke and with an MP regen spell.

[Delmontyb]

The mage changes have been great, and I really enjoy playing both Con and Thm now. I think you might want to hunt down some better gear, add some MP+ materia to it and go on from there.

I know that might not be the easiest thing to do, I am looking forward to when we have the screen that allows other players to attach materia for us. But that being said, that mages really are able to hold their own. I know THM blows enemies away, and it's quite satisfying.

I like thunder > thundra combo, using only the first and second spell, I'm able to combo and save a lot of MP and take mobs out really fast. I don't bother with thundgra much (spelling? ugh) as it's costly and I get faster cast, and recast times with the other spells.

I don't think they (SE) hate (s) mages, but I know the mobs I've killed surly do.

[Estellios]

@Dreadnought: I haven't played THM endgame yet so I can't comment on that too in-depth but so far in parties it feels really active as I have to CC with Blizzara and focus on Combo'ing adds since I can solo one while the rest of the group work on other enemies. If the group splits up and starts working on multiple enemies at once I can Fire combo stuff. Haven't run into any MP issues either unless we get unlucky and get several waves with adds in succession.

I didn't realize it at first but Excruciate raises your crit rate over time, not by number of spells cast and it lasts for 90 sec so it seems like a good thing to use as you're waiting for your mp to recover.

We will most likely have to see how Convert is handled since it could be implemented in a manner that you can continuously cycle through your MP by converting whenever you run out, and the low HP coupled with the Burst combo would provide some nice risk vs reward and considerably lower the amount of downtime you have.