SUGGESTION: Turn Bluemage into a regular job - Limited Job>Advanced Job (An Approach)

[Shougun]

. . ..

No ignoring sub jobs and items all jobs would definitely not be the similar to each other. . Each job in FFXI had a clear goal that may or may have not been horribly balanced lol. Then with the gear and sub jobs there were many ways to change the job to fit your needs. Ninja without a sub job was not a Red Mage without a sub job which was not a Black Mage nor a Ranger nor a Paladin.

Role assignments in single player game weren't clear made by the developers but they absolutely existed under design philosophy (else we wouldn't be able to describe them into roles so neatly like pretty much all the wiki's do on jobs). Even if you washed it out a bit the point still stands the blue mage did not 'do it all well' such that it counted as a multi-role (it wasn't multi-role till other systems in FFXI allowed it to be, and this wasn't due to blue mage but the other systems). Blue mage did damage fairly well and healing situationally and support (not tanking) pretty well.

Blue Mage has had versatility sure, but it's not until FFXIV that it actually multi-roled on it's own laurels. Blue Mage in FFXI was only good at doing other roles due to other systems, otherwise it was a damage dealer with a bit of variety on the side. I would accept that you say "so most of our jobs are kind of like that with their own flare" and yeah look at our current job break down, we've got 4 tanks and 3 healers and the rest of the jobs are variations of DD lol.

The point is FFXI's blue is not a multi-role job without the sub job system, and at that point many other jobs were also multi-role. BLU in and of itself in FFXI was not multi-role, people would tell you to get lost if you came with BLU as a healer if there was no sub job to support it's short comings (meanwhile white mage would be allowed in). Translating FFXI's BLU here and making it multi-role means you're also expanding the concept of BLU (which some may consider an upgrade). So if people expect that blue mage has to multi-role then they're conflating multiple systems into one job, and my point is blue mage historically and generally is not a multi-role job on it's own.

This entire conversation was started because you wanted to correct me on the idea that Blue Mage historically is not the role/concept I said it was, which through the entire history of blue until this game was clearly an offensive support job because they'd be laughed out of groups (and not used in single player) for main taking the role of healer or tank (concepts that did exist, particularly main healer, main tank was more like main dude that would survive through insane abuse just in case you needed to raise or something, or Paladin with cover). You may say but "versatility" and yeah I agree to that but versatility does not mean multi-role job. Just because you can offer some support doesn't make you a healer, you need many skills to do that. Of course with FFXIV it's the first time it is under the limited system at least, you may say this is a new page in the history for Blue Mage, a glorious page where we should be, where the new intention is multi-role. Personally if they can't make the job more exciting I don't think it was worth it though, would much rather have a well designed single role than one okay, one eh, and one bad normal job.

And that's where I started with this is that I don't see normal blue having to be multi-role to be the iconic and that personally I've far greater hope in blue if they focus on making it a single role (because if they translate their current set up to normal I've a feeling it's going to be awful for a role or two and in general less interesting than it could have been if they just designed the kit straight forward rather than play either god in balance to have real kit building or pseudo kit building for easy balance). Happy to leave the balanced for party experience limited multi-role concept alone, but I've no faith in it for DF content (or in general).

Finally I'm not twisting your points. You're just fitting my point to something I didn't say (when discussing FFXIV vs Druid I speak different than when FFXI vs Druid, or in general, the stationary value of Druid is nice as it has many similar concepts and when points are irrelevant, like in FFXIV i'm aware our armor is rigid so I don't think of gear in that situation, then the comparison works well for me visually). You said stop comparing WoW to FFs, that's FF in general (and at this point I've compared every blue mage to Druid). I responded to your points out of order simply because it's how I recalled them. Why I didn't go point by point is because I find the whole conversation kind of silly, never disagreed that the job can or can't be multi just that there is an obvious position blue mage fills and that isn't multi-role until FFXIV (even FFXI, as it was only multi-role due to other systems, else it would be laughed out of the other roles filled by jobs that actually were designed around the concept). I said like WoW you could have a FFXIV Blue Mage that just has specs (Atherial Mimicry), this is true, there are some differences naturally like gear but whatever it wasn't something I cared about focusing on (due to how gear works here, and how blue already works here, I thought it not important to point to discuss). The point was that it worked in WoW (sometimes). I understand your point is you can have all the specs without changing the gear, that point wasn't important to me for FFXIV. Then we discussed FFXI and which case it's almost literally like WoW (where the trees are set sub jobs of the main job) then where with the spec and gear you get to pick your role but you're losing out on other things. In either situation comparing to WoW is suitable and functions to what I intended. (A real world example with some vague similarities, like Blue Mage has shifting abilities so does druid- druid just has way less options, but they do shift). Especially as it illustrates that the druid has diversity but a focus. In past FF Blue Mage has always been a specific type of Druid with a specific focus, and has not been able to switch roles just because. As soon as you add in FFXI where it wasn't due to the blue mage but due to the systems unrelated to blue mage, then you can start to say Blue Mage began being able to switch specs (and had to change their gear too). But this multi-role FFXI blue mage wasn't due to blue mage's own list of skills, without the sub jobs it would have failed to multi-role (unlike Druid I guess, which on it's own talents it could). Then FFXIV is unique in that blue mage on blue mage's own talents can now multi-role, which besides having to change your gear is exceptionally close to druid again. And druid does get new and different abilities based on their spec and form they're in which is akin to a kit for Blue Mage (just don't get to pick it really lol).


Ultimate point to me is that while people may find it nice for it to be multi-role, Blue Mage has never been a multi-role job in history (Blu != main healer, BLU / WHM = main healer), and that you can evaluate single player jobs for their role even if the devs didn't specifically say what it was (all the jobs had a unique purpose that made them proficient at a specific concept, like situationally blue mage could heal sure but they were awful if you wanted to depend on them for everything, something had to make up for their short comings, something you don't have to do for jobs made for their role), including FFXI, until FFXIV came around (blue mage in FFXIV, currently as limited, can do it all, although their raise is still awful lol). And if they added normal to blue mage and it was just one role, it would still be blue mage. They could add more than one role to it as normal, though due to my negative impressions of what they've done so far I would prefer they just make it good and high quality on one job than "eh tier" on everything. If they can make it high quality on all three, and it doesn't consume so much resources we start losing other jobs, .. well that's cool and preferential (but sounds hard/unlikely).

Point from the very beginning that started this all, blue mage while versatile has had a clear focus and it wasn't every role and to add a normal blue that is only one role is totally fine.

[MaraD_]

Point from the very beginning that started this all, blue mage while versatile has had a clear focus and it wasn't every role and to add a normal blue that is only one role is totally fine.

(I type too much lol)

This is semi right, and semi wrong.
Its grey enough, that you can honestly say this, and mostly be correct.
SE didint see jobs as "Tank/Healer/DPS" back in the olschool FFs before FFXI. As was explained in FFXI why they tried to not have a dedicated tank. Any tanking options, like cover, or provoke, were not meant to be "Tank" options, but were viewed as "Supportive" options. This includes most older FFs. SE saw jobs as either "Front row" or "Back row".
Using FF4 for the best example of the system (which i hated as a kid, but was actually really ingenious) you had 5 slots, and it was 2 back + 3 front, or 3 back + 2 front.
This means at LEAST two people HAD to be in the front row, which means 2-3 people HAD to take double damage. THFs had evasion, MNKs had HP, PLDs had defense, etc.
BLM had no defenses, but was able to do maximum damage from the back row. Front row users "usually" had less effective options for the back row. And of course back row users were never hampered by the back row.

Healer vs Ranged(physical or Magical) wasnt quite established honestly, because of various factors, such as WHMs being rather strong with Hammers in early FFs, but Rosa was the 1st to not really melee. Her Holy was strong, but it took a long time to get her to use Holy. But FF4 was the 1st FF were u couldnt just stack WHMs, so she didnt need alternative options. Every job you would consider a "Healer" had good offensive options at some point. FFs were you could pick to add a "healer" (WHM usually) never actually needed a "Healer".

Of course a lot of this starts to change by FF10, as provoke was finally required for a single fight. Yunas WHM healing still was never required in any of the fights. (She was still better as a DPS to zerg bosses down)

So, looking at how SE saw it as "front row" vs "back row", its better to say the "Jack of all Trades" jobs were those who could be both a front row, and a back row job, and have little to no performance issues. BUT, so to be clear, I said that to give a generalized impression. Obviously having heals would be the secondary requirement to meet "jack of all trades".

Defensive roles pretty much just meant "front row". Not how well they managed to protect allies. Almost all healers were good at DPS, with a few exceptions in the series, such as FF4 Rosa, who could only be a DPS in certain scenarios. So its roughly safe to suggest there is a "healer" role, as a few FFs did have the role, but most didnt.

RDM and BLU were capable in both the front and back rows, and had heals. (along with defensive buffs for themselves or allies) So IMO, being a "DPS main" applies to all jobs. But being "multi-role" is definitely in their design. This is why I said earlier you were being rather misleading by saying BLU is a DPS main, with supportive abilities. That pretty much applies to every job in the series, based on game design. THFs "Steal" is literally a way for you to get powerful gear early, which makes up for THFs lower damage. Instead fo a skill that buffs a party members stats, its a skill that lets u get a perma "buff" (gear) MNKs bonus of not needing gear helps u save gil for the members who need the money more. (Depends on the game, but FF1 is the best example, where gear is costly, and magic is even more costly) Not all supportive options are skills you directly use. (Like with the MNK example) Every job has a design philosophy behind it.

Now to help support your argument, The devs have repeatedly seen BLU as different things through the series, but with examples of FF6, and FF11, the DEVs saw BLU as a Caster 1st and foremost (Back row only. Even FF14 gave RDM a melee combo, because they see it as multi-row still). Which I feel is how they saw it in 5, despite its ability to be "multi-row". The only reason it was "Multi-row" was because it started off with no spells, and they also didnt know which spells you would find, if any. In FF6, Strago not only starts with blu magic, he can also equip an Esper immediately, and have access to white and black magic + a summon. So there was no reason to give him front row potential.
So BLU is only "Multi-row" due to necessity, dependent on the game. RDM on the other hand, was clearly intended to be "multi-row" in FF5, as well as Versatile from FF1.
(This is why i actually saw RDM as the better "Multi-role" over BLU, despite BLU being a great candidate for it as well. I also felt BLU would been good as a "Choose your DPS playstyle" picking between Ranged vs Melee, and Support DPS vs Selfish DPS, back when that was a thing...This is of course just opinion, as theres more to deciding which job becomes a tank besides just being "multi-row" or even versatile.)

EDIT: Rosa technically had 11 "offensive" spells, 13 defensive spells, and for spells that could be used as either offensive or defensive she had 9 (example being how many undead littered the game, and cures can hurt undead, but melee attacks barely touched undead) I also listed cures1-4 as 4 different spells, despite being essentially the same spell, and raise/arise as different spells. If you dont consider them different spells, then she only has 10 defensive spells vs her 11 offensive spells, and by a statement you made about the number of offensive spells a person has, is how you determined if they were pure DPS, or DPS with support. This is another reason why I say this logic is misleading, even if it could be true.
EDIT#2: Interesting side notes, BLU magic in FF5 wasnt truly considered magic. (most likely due to having physical abilities and spells in the same spell list) So things like silence, and dual cast dont work with it. But this was probably due to engine limitations mostly. Maybe. For BLU spells that were magical, like Aero, all magical spells defaulted to the BLU mages magic stat, even if you were using BLU magic on a non magical job, such as a Knight with BLU magic equipped. This sort of acts like the polar opposite of RDM. Where physical jobs could use blue magic w/o penalty, but dual cast from RDM was pretty much only useful as a caster trait.