Why is no one talking about beastmaster?

[Calixis]

People were burnt with BLU being limited and Dancer being a DPS. With BST already being name dropped as a potential limited job people aren't getting their hopes up. With that being said, the Beastmasters we encounter are all very much being used in a combat role, including all of them wielding the weapon set of axe/shield. To me that's possibly a very strong hint we may well be getting them as a proper Job rather than Limited (or at least have the mini-game included as a system alongside it). Plus the reaction to BLU being a Limited Job was so overwhelmingly negative that I doubt they could've missed it.

[ItMe]

Plus the reaction to BLU being a Limited Job was so overwhelmingly negative that I doubt they could've missed it.

... was it?
I know the forums were full of people complaining, but they always are.
They're not a good representation of anything.
Do we have any hard numbers on how many people actually play BLU?

[ADVSS]

... was it?
I know the forums were full of people complaining, but they always are.
They're not a good representation of anything.
Do we have any hard numbers on how many people actually play BLU?

Maybe a search for people who finished the carnival? Took me a while but it seems like it would be enough to see if people were dedicated enough to actually complete it? Still missing like 12 skills

[Mhaeric]

Do we have any hard numbers on how many people actually play BLU?

https://ffxivcensus.com/




That said, I think that's the wrong question to be asking. Lots of people played Blue Mage, but the past tense is key. Once people are done with the various mini-games then they stop playing it.

[Shougun]

https://ffxivcensus.com/
That said, I think that's the wrong question to be asking. Lots of people played Blue Mage, but the past tense is key. Once people are done with the various mini-games then they stop playing it.

At least for myself, and a few others I've seen voice upset, certainly exactly that. A different question should be asked if you're evaluating reception.

When Yoshida claimed it a great success even though I saw all over NN, chat, forums, twitter, and reddit that most were disliking it (absolutely some people do like it, although I would note many of the reasons people who do like it are often reasons that could have been maintained via other permutations of blue mage / different better suited to PF focused limited jobs or better produced to their desires in a general sense), so at that I decided I would only view it instead of play it because it felt apparent to me they were using a very generic measure of success and I didn't want to contribute to that message. Being someone has leveled every job to max, and blue mage being massively easy to level it wasn't a choice from ability or lack of wanting to complete the level cap collection- in fact that's part of why I find blue mage frustrating to show up on my job pane.. I like them all maxed but I don't want to even vaguely send them the message that it's good fun (left it at 58 after reading they said it was good). Beyond forum and not touching it the only other message I can send that I think it's poorly executed is just not to pay my sub lol, and fortunately or unfortunately (?) the rest of the game is really good so... don't want to do that.

Originally even though I didn't like the news I wanted to give it an honest try (capped it right away, got all the solo spells very quickly, did much of the carnival, etc)- but hearing them call it great after seeing majority negative info (and having an bad play experience outside of the brief bit of nostalgia / wonder of casting something goofy) made me think they were using their data of play participation, so even though I found getting the teleport tickets super easy via blue mage, or slowly progression the job a tenable yet a bit painful proposition, yet not sure how else to send the message that it's not fun, especially not as fun as it should be (either limited or normal, either one) - so I stopped touching it all together (but I actively follow it to ensure I know what it can or can't do, what's peak performance, etc, which is why you can easily see even at end game depending on your role you're still way less of a job than even equally comparable jobs).

I'd keep testing it out if I was sure SE would know me playing it is not an endorsement, I prefer to test things hands on but I'll do it visually and through reading in fear they take it as an approval. Kind of wish they had an in game feedback system like some other games have "how was this mission?" etc lol. Then I could be more hands on but not muddy their participation data as appreciation.

[ReiMakoto]

https://ffxivcensus.com/




That said, I think that's the wrong question to be asking. Lots of people played Blue Mage, but the past tense is key. Once people are done with the various mini-games then they stop playing it.

With how very very easy it is to level a blue mage(literally can get it from 1 to 60 in 30mins) , using the census data there is likely to give a largly inflated result. More accuarate data would be using the lucky bancho census data to view the number of people who have completed the morbol mount achievement or such content, which paints a very very different picture (i.e. significantly less participation than even ultimate raids)

[Seraphor]

With how very very easy it is to level a blue mage(literally can get it from 1 to 60 in 30mins) , using the census data there is likely to give a largly inflated result. More accuarate data would be using the lucky bancho census data to view the number of people who have completed the morbol mount achievement or such content, which paints a very very different picture (i.e. significantly less participation than even ultimate raids)

Which I think is just as misleading, in the opposite direction. They're both extremes.

Why not compare it to how many people have completed Ultimate on any one specific job.
Comparing clear rates across 17 jobs combined, versus one job, isn't exactly balanced.
People may just not like how Blue Mage plays... just as I don't like how Summoner or Paladin play. Which is why more Limited Jobs to engage in the same content as BLU would be beneficial.
Beastmaster would even fit into the theme of arena battles in Uldah and in acquiring a Morbol as a pet, thus also gaining the Morbol Mount for lvl 60 savages.

Btw, going by your signature. Are you saying they should stop investing in PVP?

[ReiMakoto]

Which I think is just as misleading, in the opposite direction. They're both extremes.

Why not compare it to how many people have completed Ultimate on any one specific job.
Comparing clear rates across 17 jobs combined, versus one job, isn't exactly balanced.
People may just not like how Blue Mage plays... just as I don't like how Summoner or Paladin play. Which is why more Limited Jobs to engage in the same content as BLU would be beneficial.
Beastmaster would even fit into the theme of arena battles in Uldah and in acquiring a Morbol as a pet, thus also gaining the Morbol Mount for lvl 60 savages.

Btw, going by your signature. Are you saying they should stop investing in PVP?

My signature is mostly a joke however I certainly would say if they're investing high amounts in pvp it should probably be scaled back, they've tried to make it a thing for so long and it just doesn't stick. What I'll give PVP is at least is that theres organised days where you can queue for stuff like rival wings, and enough people take part in it casually that the queues pop relatively fast for experience in frontline. No such casual experience exists for BLU and in every trackable metric ive seen it falls well below even pvp.

Also more limited jobs is a tricky prospect to justify. More limited jobs on the same "limited job budget" will lead to cannibalisation of rescource, either BLU will get less or the new LJ will get less. We've already seen the vast difference in content between BLU update 1 and 2, with update 2 getting less spells (both numericall and in function) and less carnival, having to make content for another one alongside BLU is a gamble on rescources, and if they share content that will also lead to problems, as now BST has to be able to do the same stuff as BLU in order to share carnival stages so BSTs overall abilities will be "homogenised" with BLU's. I just can't see them adding in another limited job without the content cannibalising itself.

[Seraphor]

My signature is mostly a joke however I certainly would say if they're investing high amounts in pvp it should probably be scaled back, they've tried to make it a thing for so long and it just doesn't stick. What I'll give PVP is at least is that theres organised days where you can queue for stuff like rival wings, and enough people take part in it casually that the queues pop relatively fast for experience in frontline. No such casual experience exists for BLU and in every trackable metric ive seen it falls well below even pvp.

Also more limited jobs is a tricky prospect to justify. More limited jobs on the same "limited job budget" will lead to cannibalisation of rescource, either BLU will get less or the new LJ will get less. We've already seen the vast difference in content between BLU update 1 and 2, with update 2 getting less spells (both numericall and in function) and less carnival, having to make content for another one alongside BLU is a gamble on rescources, and if they share content that will also lead to problems, as now BST has to be able to do the same stuff as BLU in order to share carnival stages so BSTs overall abilities will be "homogenised" with BLU's. I just can't see them adding in another limited job without the content cannibalising itself.

BLU should be scaled back though. It's growth format is purely cumulative, whereas regular jobs have a set 32 maximum skills, BLU has 80 and growing. It can't be sustained. BLU should be getting fewer spells with each update anyway, and eventually it'll cap out when it gets too big.
Where will LTD job development go from there? Into other LTD jobs.

Balancing Beastmaster with BLU content will be many times easier than balancing other content. BLU is already fairly unbalanced, with most of the difficulty coming from the innate difficulty in using and coordinating it's skills. Which is why gaining the Morbol mount can be both far easier or far harder than those same savages on regular jobs on ilvl, depending on your party.
It's more in line with Bozja and it's Lost Actions, which enable people to essentially become any role as their own job.
Balancing Beastaster with BLU should be no more complicated than balancing a Tank WHM with a Healer GNB in Bozja. And yes, I've seen WHMs tank the entirety of Castrum Lacus Litore.

[Alleo]

... was it?
I know the forums were full of people complaining, but they always are.
They're not a good representation of anything.
Do we have any hard numbers on how many people actually play BLU?

Why should we not use the forum? Just because only a small part of the playerbase visit it does not mean that it cant show how good a content is accepted or not. Heck with stuff like Diadem the forum was right all along and when the forum (and some other sites) were on flames after Shirogane Savage the devs reacted and doubled the wards in every zone..so yes the forum is an indicator. (After all if you do statistics you also dont need all the people, just a good enough sample size)

And as others have said, you cant take numbers as the only pure fact..I have leveled blue to at least lvl 50, I still disliked it..but I would have counted as those playing it. Just like Eureka..people need to try it out for a bit to make a decision. So people playing it does not mean that they like it. There is also the problem that there is no way to tell SE what we think other than forum, reddit and other sources. So yes those sources are valuable and should not just be taken out of it because they are only used by a small amount of people. Sadly I think that SE just takes a look at the amount of players using it and take it as success...no matter if maybe some are running it just for other reasons, like certain mounts or because it makes it easier for farming fates.