Suggesting Ideas for Blue Mage with feedback & Removing Limited Job Status

[AnotherPerson]

Yeah, I agree. Limited Jobs that focus on collecting would be best because at the end of the day they'd be optional. Let's say they make Beastmaster a Limited Job and you can get exclusive beasts from Hunt Targets, but only if the party is Beastmasters Level Sync'd. You don't have to hunt down the giant fox in Yanxia as a BST to get the ability to summon her, but if you want to you're going to put forth the effort. It'd go a long way towards revitalizing older content.

As long as you don't have to pay out of game for them like on Mog Station. P2W would kill a Limited Job.

Doesn't sound plausible - at some point players will be done hunting for BST collections and then new players won't have a full synced party in the FATE to get their BST collections as easily - Party Finder could work but it's different from being able to queue a data-center into a duty as the FATE requires you to be there on the spot with no guarantee on spawning. FATE could just as well time out before a full party of BST gathers up.

Even if people do show up on these Hunts, there's no guarantee they'll be running BST or BLU or another job entirely.

[Seraphor]

I do think the biggest missed opportunity with BLU is in not giving it horizontal progression.
It still has vertical progression like the rest of the game because you have definite 'best' skills and you unlock most of those by collected everything before them.

Beast Tamer could make this work better, by having different pets have different skill load outs, all with strengths and weaknesses, with more weight on the 'glamour' of the pet.
This way collecting their pets is like collecting mounts. You don't need to do it all at once to complete it and can come back for it at any time.
But this can only work if things like "tame 30 beasts" isn't a requirement for further progression.

[Leidolf]

Doesn't sound plausible - at some point players will be done hunting for BST collections and then new players won't have a full synced party in the FATE to get their BST collections as easily - Party Finder could work but it's different from being able to queue a data-center into a duty as the FATE requires you to be there on the spot with no guarantee on spawning. FATE could just as well time out before a full party of BST gathers up.

Even if people do show up on these Hunts, there's no guarantee they'll be running BST or BLU or another job entirely.

Mmm... Fair enough. Maybe just have the target drop materials that can be used to make a monster if you participated in the Hunt in any class like in FFEX?

[Kokpit]

in my opinion , SE need to rework bluemage first for future update
for example is " Limit Break " , SE need to rework bluemage so this class can use LB depend with ur mimicry , like if u using tank mimicry then your LB is LB tank
i know for tank LB maybe it can be cheese with Diamondback like A12s transition.
i'm saying they need to rework LB if they are planning bluemage can do Stormblood ultimate ( UCOB and UWU ) in next expansion
i was imagining if they really make it happen then how bluemage can do in ultima ( UWU ) transition , the part where u need to use caster LB , healer LB , and tank LB ?

and yeah its gonna be fun if bluemage can do ultimate

[Leidolf]

Personally, I'd say just make them do Omega and get the Optimized versions of the LBs Omega-M and Omega-F keep slapping you in the face with. You can have one equipped in a 25th slot and that acts as your LB, eating up the gauge when it reaches three full stacks.

[Mansion]

I understand their concern regarding the DF situation was having player queueing in dungeons while not having enough skills, making it a pain for the team. I'm no whizz kid of the technology there, but if they can block jobs quests behind "unlock these abilities", couldn't they block BLU queueing in the DF unless they have X number of spells? Also, there are simply too much spells which barely have a reason to exist compared to others. They should implement a system where spells just upgrade with levels. On the bare bones kit, you only need 6 magic spells of 6 elements, one physical, one for weaving, a bit of CC and the few skills that make it have a proper rotation (Libra, Off guard etc.) Perhaps having sets just for BLU roles with say 24 spells for Tanking, 24 spells for healing etc.

The whole balancing argument seems off to me because low level dungeons are already speedrun by normal jobs due to how gear and potencies scale (hello Dancer in anything pre level 50). A few Missiles would not change so much.

But in any case, I'd prefer a wateed down general casting job with Blue flavour rather than this limited job. It dies 3 weeks after its patch release, it lacks originality, does not have any interesting rewards for its solo content...

[Colt47]

The blue mage spells problem is sort of a challenge from the perspective of a game developer. Ideally, we want Spell A and Spell B at point X to be "choices", but given the nuances in how the game works in combat if Spell A does even a small bit more damage than spell B, spell A will be used exclusively over spell B. Then imagine having this situation happening with 50 or more unique abilities they can pick up: The QA team would be spending more time testing Blue Mage for balance purposes than the entirety of the non-blue mage classes.

So the path to making Blue Mage legitimate would mean axing a ton of spells from the list to get it down to a core few, and then at that point we're no longer really blue mages.

[ReiMakoto]

The blue mage spells problem is sort of a challenge from the perspective of a game developer. Ideally, we want Spell A and Spell B at point X to be "choices", but given the nuances in how the game works in combat if Spell A does even a small bit more damage than spell B, spell A will be used exclusively over spell B. Then imagine having this situation happening with 50 or more unique abilities they can pick up: The QA team would be spending more time testing Blue Mage for balance purposes than the entirety of the non-blue mage classes.

So the path to making Blue Mage legitimate would mean axing a ton of spells from the list to get it down to a core few, and then at that point we're no longer really blue mages.

This would be correct if not for the fact there already is a core blu rotation for damage dealing, as over half the spells blu can learn are straight up copies of each other, or inferior versions of each other. The 220 potency aoe meme exists for a reason

Edit: For the unitiated.

16 220 potency skills, with the only standouts being Rams Voice for freeze, Electrogenesis for range, and sharpened knife for weaving. No axing required, you could take any of these and be doing the same amount of damage.
17 <220 potency skills, mostly situational/useless. Standouts are Bad Breath for the damage down, Sonic Boom as a ranged weaving tool, and honourable mention to Black/White knights tour however it only half works because most dungeon mobs are immune to bind so it only reaches half its potential, and it doesnt work on bosses. Honourable mention as well to perpetual ray for stun locking in full blu parties in certain scenarios, scenarios which cannot occur if blu was a full job. No axing required, however most of these skills are already not used due to being too situational or downright bad.
5 damage buff skills. These would come under mandatory in a full job scenario. Pec Light/Off Guard, bristle and moon flute would all be mandatory, whistle would be more dubious due to if they would allow final sting. Again no Axing required
3 kill yourself moves. Doubt these would be allowed if blu was a full job, remvoing them doesnt remove identity however imo.
9 Pure utility moves. All of these are already never taken over damage or more useful skills, so could already reasonably be considered axed outside of memeing around/ carnival (these are moves like snort/ loom/ sticky toungue ect)
Primal Skills: One of each cooldown length is already mandatory. Would involve no axing as you could take shock strike or mountain buster and be doing the same damage.
Magic Hammer/Devour/ Song of Torment. Again already considered mandatory, no axing required
10 Defensive Utility: The most controversial set of abilities. Stuff like white wind or exuviate would see situational use in the raiding scene and have that "clutch" factor that could save a dungeon run. Mighty Guard and Diamondback however would only ever see limited use as a way to try and solo tank some fights, however as most fights can already be solo healed, yet is attempted by very few people I wouldn't see this as too much trouble. These are the ones I could reasonably see getting Axed or limited in group play but I still do not think that axing some of these would lose BLU's identity.
5 % skills. These would again need axed or heavily adjusted to work in party play. Some say these skills are a part of BLU's identity, in that case adjusting could be in order for them. They already do not work on raid bosses themselves, only adds, so if adds gained immunity, and if the success rate of level 5 death was toned down so it doesn't demolish an entire add pack if you're a little lucky then they honestly wouldnt be too powerful, (level 5 being 25% chance per mob on a 5+ min cd wouldn't be too powerful given how pulls are gated, launcher already can't be spammed due to mp cost and the other % moves are single target)
and Finally Condensed Libra and Aetheric Mimicry as "blu only" skills. These skills only work within the context of BLU only parties so would either be useless or just straight up axed in group play (mimicry giving you permanant devilment is not adding to blu's identity)

In summary, the majority of BLU's skills would not get the axe in a full blu setting due to how similar/useless they are. The few that would be axed I would argue do not add to blu's identity in such a way that we wouldn't be blue mages without them, and the ones that would be adjusted to remain would also be still in line with being a blue mage.

This is all not even mentioning that the entire concept of being a "Legitimate Blue Mage" is an abitrary construct to begin with, and as various other final fantasy games have shown can be as limited as learning less than 15 skills, or games where they do not learn any "problem skills" only having damage and support.

Edit 2: My counting might be wrong but the point still stands

[Morningstar1337]

This would be correct if not for the fact there already is a core blu rotation for damage dealing, as over half the spells blu can learn are straight up copies of each other, or inferior versions of each other. The 220 potency aoe meme exists for a reason

Which incidentally is a result of gutting elemental resistances and sequestering them to to specific pieces of content, (one of which BLU cannot access and works differently anyway)

[Shougun]

The blue mage spells problem is sort of a challenge from the perspective of a game developer. Ideally, we want Spell A and Spell B at point X to be "choices", but given the nuances in how the game works in combat if Spell A does even a small bit more damage than spell B, spell A will be used exclusively over spell B. Then imagine having this situation happening with 50 or more unique abilities they can pick up: The QA team would be spending more time testing Blue Mage for balance purposes than the entirety of the non-blue mage classes.

So the path to making Blue Mage legitimate would mean axing a ton of spells from the list to get it down to a core few, and then at that point we're no longer really blue mages.

I didn't use the FFXI forums but at least in game when blue mage was added everyone was fine with it being balanced for actual gameplay, I don't recall it ever being "it's not reaaaal" - and honestly I thought FFXIV's would improve FFXI's, it didn't (imo), and I'd rather have FFXI's at this point- which I feel would be less quality then they could accomplish now with more complicated interworking systems.

It's frustrating because not just this reason but so many reasons make think "what.. why, no that's not even slightly true, you did it because you wanted to not because you had to- be honest with me" - like one thing that is quite bothersome with this is that they didn't go hog wild when they were afraid for balance. They went half balanced half powered and, to me, it just feels half realized. There is a clear line of useless spells and upgrade spells from previous sets of spells, mostly linear with a baby touch of horizontal / "what do I need to beat this circus level". There is also a rotation as ReiMakoto points out, and honestly from feedback I read and hear people like Blue Mage the more structure it gets so it shows that it wasn't some free form "choose bat drain because it sucks". That people enjoy it best when they are able to weave in their oGCDs and have order with their chaos, things that could have been made more gameplay compelling and interesting if they had actually built the job with full support. Which is why I usually reference Diablo 3 legendary affix system, when discussing a more interesting less balanced full power limited, as a way they could have been inspired to make order with chaos, with fire angon triggering fire waves on other fire spells you might see a blue mage go out of their way to build fire- but that'd not be the only spell that weaves into others and so you'd get people building hybrids or sometimes just pure X elements/spell chains. As new spells are added their entire kit may shift, as they themselves learn new spells their entire preferred play style could change, as fights behave certain ways they may have their incredi-burst, sustain, whatever they feel 'feels good', etc builds.

Also as an aside Fire Agnon being an example of a spell that we get that's not what the enemy uses, being an example of how their logic of why blue is blue, the blue they gave us, is not consistent and shows that they did it the way they did simply because they wanted to and the reasons given to us are more like vague, imo abrasive, shadows. Otherwise fire angon would throw a spear that would stay at location to further expel fire damage that stacks a debuff, likely with some sort of stacking cooldown mechanic, which is interesting, yet it clearly doesn't- what actually is for us is a balanced generic aoe potency fire spell.

To me blue mage is using monster theme'd and inspired abilities that you learn in the wild, something they absolutely could have done as a main job here. No they couldn't have given the job full power death* but they avoided giving the blue mage entirely borked variants anyways, they wanted it to have a little bit of balance, they have a vague rotation, they just didn't give it the full treatment. Blue Mage has me disappointed at a level that I wish it wasn't called Blue Mage just so I could better live in my own bubble. Every time I open up my job UI in game I just feel a bit disappointed. Luckily I have jobs I do like, but just seeing his logo generates a sigh. *Even not having full powered death if blue was normal is only partially true, beyond the obviously "close to original" options you could mix limited and core together into something I've called Advanced Job (throw back to FFXI/tactic games), here your limited helps you gather and do old content with less focus on balance (diablo 3 affix madness) and then your core set of skills that are monster skills that you did gather from the wild that are also balanced and specifically designed for gameplay value (combos, interactions, ogcds, etc).

Here we are with half balanced half over powered (not balanced for interesting choices/builds, balanced so it isn't 'too OP' so they can make it forced PF only group content, balanced in the direct face of their argument that blue is limited so it can be unbalanced) and directly bound to a specific type of content I've never had interested in (PF, no thanks), with the logic used that had to be specific way usually just feeling like "we wanted it this way" as there isn't actually a true through line of blue that requires that and they could have made other creative solutions- all in all blue mage as is is probably my one of my two top saltiest decisions for FFXIV. It may not look it but I've tried to reword stuff to be as conveying of disappointment without being insulting but in general I found the direction of blue mage just..... done my boy really dirty. They could have gone wild while giving it a breath of life, as discussed with spells that interweave with each other, they could have made it normal and exciting with new mechanics, and rather they went into forced party finder content to even feel vaguely like an actual job all in order to do old content slightly faster than normal when synced down. None of the decisions of blue mage, even if I try to look from their lens and think limited job, particularity impress me and I feel they could have done better- normally I wouldn't care if it's not content made for me but this was content I had really wanted to see, so I still do care even though I can see them tossing blue mage to a play style I'd never enjoy. Although I don't enjoy taking content away from others as well, which is why in housing I am actively against purging the wards when wishing for instanced content, and in context of blue mage I've tried to suggest ideas that keep it limited via going advanced with unique mechanics in limited that allow it to both be a solo god and or a party loot lord (explicitly for old content, if you sync down for example you can get more loot, but if you go unsynced you're going to be wreck it ralph in a a china shop).

Beyond the whole argument of real spells or not, just to add for a "real" blue mage that most of the FF blue mages don't have 200 spells either. So having to have so many spells is not a 'real' blue mage feature. The only consistent part has been learning monster spells, before FFXI you might have said learning full powered monster spells that are of unique interest (white wind, etc) but in these definitions FFXIV's version is neither real nor fake as with most things FF they take vague elements and move on. So if they had made a full job blue it would have been as real as our current vision, so long as it learned monster spells which could have been done a variety of ways (and I mean a variety, I've seen like 15 different ways this could have been achieved and most of them being fairly balanced). Like the issue with SMN originally, it didn't feel like summoner because the only true through line wasn't pet class or one time spells it was the summon- that was the only through line and a line they missed significantly when the job was first added (as you see now though SMN has two demi primals and largely every time that sort of addition is made I hear a lot of excitement, some people wanting the entire job to be demi-primal based). Personally I think SMN has come a long way and is quite interesting and fun job that better realizes its theme too and I do feel summoner-y at the level cap (I do wish for more primal-y inspired stuff but I'm okay with it as it is now too), definitely a job I enjoy to play and inhabit the role of.

So I'm not saying our blue now is fake as much as I think it was not made that interesting as it should have been, and normally I wouldn't be so harsh but it's a content that I was eagerly looking forward to and had asked for (multiple times, from a very long time ago). Unlike a content I've no interest in and want other players to have fun in their sandboxes (like ultimate). If blue mage had to be limited I feel they could have done a much better job making it more interesting and valuable, and if blue was to be normal I feel they could have done a good job with that too. It's okay some people like it, but like mentioned this was actually a content I had my foot in the door since 1.0 so unlike ultimate I don't intend to clap or smile when others are happy.. As I said before I do have a job I really enjoy, so it's not like "welp time to leave the game", and I've played all the other jobs and I think most are pretty fun, and the ones that I don't think are pretty fun are because I just don't think I play them very well lol (pretty fun -> fun), yet the job I had wanted out of all the jobs I've played (all of them) is not even in the list of jobs I like the least it's in the list of jobs I dislike the most (Blue Mage) and it's by itself because I actually find the other jobs interesting even if I've trouble playing them to a level I think is good. Which makes the blue mage feelings worse because I had high hopes for them, if I like most of the jobs quite a bit and others decently, what would happen when they make a job I'm eagerly waiting for?1! Hyp-- no.. no hype.. only dreams dashed and salt left and all for reasons that feel more like excuses. It's fine to say they wanted to try it this way, which I think it's the truth rather, but that 'it had to be this way' because it wouldn't be real otherwise sounds disingenuous. Scholar for the most part being the one I think I'm not that good at, I'm just dumb when it comes to being ahead of the damage schedule I guess- not that people die but just I can be a damage healer for days as AST or WHM and keep everyone alive easily at the same time while SCH I feel like my brain is made of glue, the rest I feel I play 'pretty well'.

Uhm.. Humbug.. lol.

Just a final statement while I want to convey my energy, which is quite a strong one, against what has been done and to making suggestions and reasons why it should either be further altered or more carefully done in the future (not many suggestions in this post but I've put a lot of effort into suggestions in other posts as I don't want just criticism, I'd hope it to have some elements of construction), and soon try to make my own silly blue mage concept to try and add some more constructive elements, ultimately really I don't want whoever that made this content to feel threatened or sleepless (some people take criticism to heart, I do that sometimes; although, some might laugh and middle finger me.. lol) so if whoever made it, if they gets my post(s), I hope the energy doesn't got to their heart as emotional pain and just towards the job itself.. I want the job I don't want to excise pain from the heart of who put effort into it.