Why we have to rethink the way we allow Limited jobs

[Morningstar1337]

There is a paradox, a catch 22. OOH players would be kicked without having the proper skills, but at the same time if vital skills are locked behind content then they would have to run them.

The solution would've been to make those skills avilaable without running instanced content. Via Totems, new fates or the Carnivale itself

[Tonkra]

I rethought the concept of BLU for the regular job system. As well as renaming it from "limited" into an "advanced" job, just like in Final Fantasy XI Online.

If you are interested and support the idea, feel free:
https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...b-(An-Approach)

[TeraTyrantShadic]

There is a paradox, a catch 22. OOH players would be kicked without having the proper skills, but at the same time if vital skills are locked behind content then they would have to run them.

The solution would've been to make those skills avilaable without running instanced content. Via Totems, new fates or the Carnivale itself

It is not a problem when at Level 15 you learn at least 12 spells. Which are Water Cannon, Blood Drain, Acorn Bomb, Ice Spikes, Bomb Toss, Sticky Tongue, Faze, Self- Destruct, Final Sting, Mighty Guard, White Wind and Off-guard. If anything Blue Mage at earlier levels without Mind Blast from the second dungeon has good crowd control abilities early on, they can spam Bomb Toss which is learnable through goblins and are near the city states of Limsa Lominsa and Ul'dah making them a pseudo White Mage with the capability to stun lock mobs like Holy can before the mobs become immune to it. Acorn bomb is for the party want to deal with the mobs one by one (mainly Melees, BRD and MCH), though I am pretty sure most classes (DNC, SMN with green carbuncle, BLM, RDM, WAR, PLD, DRK and GNB) at level 15 have their AoE unlocked already but either way it is nice to have the option for it and not just that but BLM has Sleep at Level 10. As for Boss encounters they have Off-Guard (Trick attack but for Blue Mages) and the capability to stun a boss with either Faze or Bomb Toss. Which in earlier levels is pretty good. This can only happen if they put in effort learning Blue Mage.

In the worst case scenario, people can get kicked and the report function is there for it however it is not the best solution since it goes both ways. An even better solution would be to either mark enemies like hunting log from ARR or the starter quest gives you 5 more spells from the get go and you remove the EXP boosting function. Seriously we have thought about a scenario with just them jumping to Level 60 in an hour or two with their friend killing the Level 60 mobs after tagging it, but we have not seen the what would happen if they just have it as a normal job without the EXP boost, if anything it'll encourage them move to Level through FATEs, Mobs (With the Spell book telling them which region it is in but still being vague, another problem with this is that it only mentions one region but many other regions have similar mobs and it is not listed in the Book) and Leves. I can be certain people would look at their spell book and go, 'Huh... there is a Blue Magic spell around here, I might as well try and find it while I am leveling'. Also they should have just be able to see the totems and the requirements for them rather than it appearing only after a certain condition has been met.


That should be the case for lower level spells. If there are more overworld spells then what we have is almost akin to 250+ spells like FFXI. Cause the point of Blue Mage is to learn spells and some spells will become obsolete, just like in FFXI the early spells you learn at level 1- 30 will be useful to you until you get new and better spells. The point of overworld spells in FFXIV is to allow you to have the basic necessities for them to be used in participating in duty finder content. As of now we have 36 overworld spells 9 of which are through Leves, Hunts and FATEs. Meaning you get 27 overworld (without including FATEs, Leves and Hunts) spells at Level 60, not just that but additional 4 spells from totem totaling to 31 spells. You can try and do some of the Masked Carnival and learn Moon Flute with just 10 stages cleared or Doom with 20 stages cleared (though you may need some spells form dungeons, trials and raid to clear some of these stages so I'll exclude 20 stage clears). Which then you have 32 spells to pick and choose from. Obviously at first you can only queue as a DPS but that is the thing, how are you going to tank if you don't have any abilities to mitigate. Healing is not a problem cause White Wind and Exuviation can be learned easily and with what we have now you can just set yourself as healer role but you need Aetherial Mimicry which is from a level 60 dungeon. At Level 15 you can learn up to 12 Spells, 1 is from a quest, 8 from overworld mobs within level 1-15 and 3 of which is from Whalaqee totems.

[Ladon]

The Blue Mage Log pretty much solved most of the concerns of the OP.

Limited jobs don't need to be converted to standard jobs. What they did with 50-60 is perfect. It has allowed for approaching old content in entirely new ways and it has been some of the most fun I have had in the game in a while. This is a far better direction and use of resources than just trying to convert BLU into yet another DPS whos role can be filled by any of the other DPS jobs.

[TeraTyrantShadic]

The Blue Mage Log pretty much solved most of the concerns of the OP.

Limited jobs don't need to be converted to standard jobs. What they did with 50-60 is perfect. It has allowed for approaching old content in entirely new ways and it has been some of the most fun I have had in the game in a while. This is a far better direction and use of resources than just trying to convert BLU into yet another DPS whos role can be filled by any of the other DPS jobs.

Blue Mage Log sadly is not the perfect solution, some will do it no doubt. However during the initial 1/2 week hype people will try to finish everything in 1 week and will never return back to it, Masked Carnival, Blue Mage Log, Spell Collecting and achievements exclusively for Blue Mage is nothing more than a filler content. If anything it is only a small solution to a long term problem.

Limited Job has to be converted, because it is nothing more than a system that only houses a job just like the Normal Job system but worse. If what you find Blue Mage is fun then sure, it can still be fun even when it is implemented as a Normal Job. Just imagine that Blue Mage was implemented like this but under the normal job system. Everything would still be there, we already have an example of such a thing. Fisher and their exclusive content Ocean Fishing. Plus most of the spells from 50-60, are more in touch with playing a group and slowly giving it tanking and healing capabilities. Though their tanking capability is somewhat lackluster.

It didn't approach content any differently other than participating as an All Blue Mage Party and having an achievement behind it. People have been doing these All One Specific Class (PLD or RDM as an example) in Party Finders randomly, I mean its basically random's fun but in a official way with an achievement behind it. Limited Job is not even a direction worth going into, because on a long term investment it is not worth it as all it did was acting like a filler content back in 50 (4.5). Once people are done with it they move on to more pressing matters like raiding and the such. Same applies to 60, after the hyped died down back to raiding or whatever people do. Same thing will happen at Level 70, we will have activity as a Blue Mage for 1 to 2 weeks and then we all wait for the next patch for Blue Mage. Filler content, is not a good money sink for a developer of any kind. Filler content doesn't contribute to the overall game experience but only to an island of content separated from the rest of the content, meaning you'll receive rare updates and nothing more. The reason why Blue Mage has to be a Normal Job is because from then on not only will it has its own exclusive content but they can participate in the same content as other jobs normally. Investing a lot of money in a mini game, is just not worth it.

If anything people want Chemist as a normal job and if they were to develop limited job then they may probably decide to finish chemist half way and put it into the Limited Job System. So it would be a better decision to invest time and money on making a job normal rather than making it limited. Also I'll be very clear here that they will never re-adjust old raids to fit a specific one class all party because that would affect the normal jobs as well. Mainly because if you adjust the stats and mechanics of a fight then it might break some of the mechanics within the fight making it harder for a normal party composition to redo it especially when it is in Duty Roulette: Normal Raids. If we develop more on Limited Job, not only we will have some cases where a job will have a difficult time completing certain raids (A8S and A12S if going as an All Blue Mage Party) with its composition. We would have also managed to create an near identical copy of a normal job system but worse. So at that point you may as well get rid of Limited Job since it is a system that is similar to Normal Job, but with a horrible restriction.

[JiSH]

Blue Mage Log sadly is not the perfect solution, some will do it no doubt. However during the initial 1/2 week hype people will try to finish everything in 1 week and will never return back to it, Masked Carnival, Blue Mage Log, Spell Collecting and achievements exclusively for Blue Mage is nothing more than a filler content. If anything it is only a small solution to a long term problem.

It's more like the whole thing is just a filler content for now, i've seen the idea of making special duty finder for BLU getting thrown around but i think it still won't fix the problem since like you said, it'll die within the first weeks, sure it might help people who came late to the content but i don't think it'll help by that much. Making them queueable via normal duty finder doesn't really work either because how their skills work, they can put skills requirement gate for it so people can only enter when they have specific skills, but then again people use duty finder to level jobs, and BLU is easily power-leveled in the overworld.

[ADVSS]

It's more like the whole thing is just a filler content for now, i've seen the idea of making special duty finder for BLU getting thrown around but i think it still won't fix the problem since like you said, it'll die within the first weeks, sure it might help people who came late to the content but i don't think it'll help by that much. Making them queueable via normal duty finder doesn't really work either because how their skills work, they can put skills requirement gate for it so people can only enter when they have specific skills, but then again people use duty finder to level jobs, and BLU is easily power-leveled in the overworld.

Youre right about that, people would bring BLU into DF if it were max level equal to the other jobs, if allowed, maybe for tome farming. Outside of that, theyd be hurting their tome count if they went in as current. Lately I've been using DF for levelling exclusively, esp now that I know new tome gear is coming in another month

[omeganova45]

I think it is better if it were made into a Normal Job, I know I tried and I really couldn't enjoy it much even when I am slowly leveling it alone without friends it is not just worth my time investment unlike the gathering since I can actually make gil.

[Kaliesto]

Blue Mage should be a normal job; most of its abilities cannot do much to a lot of its current opposition.

When it was first introduced to ARR content that it completely steamrolled it, but with Heavensward there is a immediate slowdown; seems Blue Mage still gets balanced because of it.

[Canadane]

I really liked the blue mage challenges.
I'm not sure why people were under the impression it's supposed to be casual, though the raids you are asked to do are quite easier compared to normal jobs from back in the day.

Also it's hardly solo content. It's just limited content. You still party and raid and have a good old time.