Easiest to Hardest DPS jobs?

[Gserpent]

The mobility and how much easier it is to play SMN compared to BLM is massive theirs a reason why Summoner has the highest caster play rate, Despite performing way less then BLM, (by a massive margin) as generally it's way easier to pick up and perform well on the job.

How's BLM really been "sanded" down if anything it's one of the few Jobs that actually feel fun and unique to play.

I was never a BLM main, but off the top of my head, Leylines being homogenized to 120 sec instead of its own thing is part of it, and additional charges of Triplecast on top of numerous trait upgrades to Sharpcast and while most agree Paradox is fun, it's undeniable that it greatly simplifies the basic rotation.

BLM wasn't that hard to play in ShB, but there were still a lot of things you could do to squeeze out extra performance, mostly in regards to memorizing the fight and knowing where you could stand and greed. But BLM has *so much* mobility now that it's largely unnecessary. You stand and cast during the extremely long "boss has just done a thing, here's 20 seconds to hit them before they start doing the next thing" windows, and when you need to move you are virtually guaranteed to have a Firestarter, Thundercloud, Xenoglossy, Triplecast, etc available to use.

[Nizzi]

I was never a BLM main, but off the top of my head, Leylines being homogenized to 120 sec instead of its own thing is part of it, and additional charges of Triplecast on top of numerous trait upgrades to Sharpcast and while most agree Paradox is fun, it's undeniable that it greatly simplifies the basic rotation.

BLM wasn't that hard to play in ShB, but there were still a lot of things you could do to squeeze out extra performance, mostly in regards to memorizing the fight and knowing where you could stand and greed. But BLM has *so much* mobility now that it's largely unnecessary. You stand and cast during the extremely long "boss has just done a thing, here's 20 seconds to hit them before they start doing the next thing" windows, and when you need to move you are virtually guaranteed to have a Firestarter, Thundercloud, Xenoglossy, Triplecast, etc available to use.

Paradox actually enables a huge amount of optimization that lets you "squeeze out extra performance" and it makes BLM probably the only job thats skill ceiling increased in EW while having its skill floor lowered for casual players. BLM optimization enables the usage of Transpose lines and Double Transpose lines, something that isn't really "simple". Leylines is also up at virtually every "big movement mechanic" since the developers seemed to have designed that all around the 2m burst meta.



This is the casts of the top log for P5S, just to show for example. BLM optimization is still all about squeezing out extra performance and knowing where you can stand still and greed to cast more Fire IVs, except this time with Transpose optimization to make sure you hit Bliz III and IV as little as possible. Compare that to something like SMN, where your optimization is just... maybe changing your Garuda/Titan order depending on if you can swiftcast Slipstream to snapshot more buffs, and holding Fester for the 2m window. Even though BLM has undeniably gotten easier in some regards from ShB into EW, the difference in how it feels to play BLM well versus playing SMN well is like playing an entirely different game. BLM is so different from any other job at this point, as someone who did this entire tier on it, I'd say it doesn't feel like it belongs in this game at all anymore. BLM demands so much more than any other job that it's not right to say that it's comparable to SMN, since it's absolutely not. BLM is a great example of how you can lower the skill floor while not lowering the skill ceiling; SMN is by far the worst example of that since it was a total crashing down of any skill ceiling SMN had, along with its skill floor.

[Gserpent]

Thank you for the detailed information. I appreciate a more experienced opinion on the matter. If any class would prove a possibility of "low floor, high ceiling," it makes sense it would be the one that Yoshida has direct, personal involvement with. I wish that could be said for all classes.

My focus is primarily on skill floor, however. Because outside of pushing for week 1-2 clears (or, hell, let's be generous and call it month 1, since I've known numerous groups that took over a month to clear e9s and e5s raiding twice a week for a couple hours), you don't need the extra 5% DPS that comes from optimizing your rotations and such. For groups that are clearing and reclearing "late," it's really just about improving performance on mechanics, because they're going to go into these fights with a significant item level advantage over the expected baseline.

[VictorTheed]

Sam, Reaper, Dragoon were easy to learn for me.

BLM, Sage & Ninja were the hardest for me to learn.

[Mithron]

I was never a BLM main, but off the top of my head, Leylines being homogenized to 120 sec instead of its own thing is part of it, and additional charges of Triplecast on top of numerous trait upgrades to Sharpcast and while most agree Paradox is fun, it's undeniable that it greatly simplifies the basic rotation.

It's also important to note that BLM has more mobility now than RDM, which conflicts with its class identity IMO.

[Raikai]

It is not meaningfully harder to play BLM than SMN. It is a very simple class. Literally every class is very simple. Yes, some classes are even simpler than others, but that doesn't mean the classes you're comparing them to are remotely difficult to play. Yes, even Yoshida's treasured Black Mage has been sanded down to fractions of what it once was. And yet it still manages to be miserable to play when synced down....

I don't think BLM should be analyzed like that. Yes, in a vacuum both are kind of equal regarding complexity (maybe BLM ahead a little bit because of very optimized transpose lines 'challenge play'), but in an actual fight situation, BLM play demands perfect timing and undivided attention and knowledge of the fight, so you know when to use your triples/swift, placement of your Ley Lines, etc. It might be just me but even when the fight is on "reclear mode" I still need to keep my senses heightened despite knowing every moment of the fight.

Whereas on SMN I can play to its maximum potential while being distracted with people on voice chat talking about random things midway.

Also, another thing to mention is that each fight has its own skill ceiling for BLM, given how the job works.

[Gserpent]

It's also important to note that BLM has more mobility now than RDM, which conflicts with its class identity IMO.

Yup. It's also why I didn't like that they changed all healers to 1.5 sec casts - WHM lost a bit of its identity as the "rewarded for memorizing safe spots" healer.

I don't think BLM should be analyzed like that. Yes, in a vacuum both are kind of equal regarding complexity (maybe BLM ahead a little bit because of very optimized transpose lines 'challenge play'), but in an actual fight situation, BLM play demands perfect timing and undivided attention and knowledge of the fight, so you know when to use your triples/swift, placement of your Ley Lines, etc. It might be just me but even when the fight is on "reclear mode" I still need to keep my senses heightened despite knowing every moment of the fight.

Whereas on SMN I can play to its maximum potential while being distracted with people on voice chat talking about random things midway.

Also, another thing to mention is that each fight has its own skill ceiling for BLM, given how the job works.

I don't know, man. BLM has so much mobility now and the ability to pretty much always have a Firestarter or Thundercloud on demand, plus LL lines up perfectly with buffs... so aside from knowing where to drop your lines during the expected "2 minute mechanic", I don't think there's that much to optimize on the class, compared to Shadowbringers, much less SB or earlier. I really feel like 2 charges of Triplecast on top of all the trait buffs to Sharpcast was a mistake.

[NitsuLeviathan]

It's also important to note that BLM has more mobility now than RDM, which conflicts with its class identity IMO.

Red mage has ALWAYS been the least mobile caster. even back in stormblood. In fights like kefka and omega, having red mage bait kefkas forsaken 2 puddles or omegas chain of memory would result in them literally not doing damage during those mechanics. A lesson I learned when a blackmage educated me that they have full uptime due to triplecast/sharpcast during phases with heavy movement. Red mage has always lacked mobility which is typically something people don't know unless bringing them into extreme/savage content where they experience mechanics that actually require a lot of movement.

[Rithy255]

I'm not a expert on casters, but I generally like them a lot and think they're actually pretty well designed (In most areas anyway...), Also I think they still don't do enough DPS in general, RDM and BLM especially (also Physical ranged), Red Mage and Black Mage generally suffer both from mobility issues, it's not a bad thing as it makes them actually unique and situational sometimes, Keeps Summoner as the "mobile caster". I think It's fine that Jobs do have some drawbacks it's what makes casters more interesting then your average group of Jobs.

I don't see how you can really compare the 3, BLM = You have one Caster that lacks Mobility and Utility but makes up in it with better optimised damage with knowing the fight better, RDM = you have another caster that is meant to be more of a Mix between melee and spell casting, but can lack mobility in areas and is bound to melee, SMN = for something that's more simple but it's pretty conformable and doesn't have a lot of the cast times that RDM/BLM have.

While I think the SMN rework was generally questionable, I think generally I like how the casters currently work I think they have way more Interesting differences then something compared to as a melee, I don't think I can agree with anyone saying they feel really the same to play (for me) even BLM/RDM feel completely different and have benefits and drawbacks.

[Valence]

Red mage has ALWAYS been the least mobile caster. even back in stormblood. In fights like kefka and omega, having red mage bait kefkas forsaken 2 puddles or omegas chain of memory would result in them literally not doing damage during those mechanics. A lesson I learned when a blackmage educated me that they have full uptime due to triplecast/sharpcast during phases with heavy movement. Red mage has always lacked mobility which is typically something people don't know unless bringing them into extreme/savage content where they experience mechanics that actually require a lot of movement.

That's only seeing one face of the coin. RDM used to be way better at step dodging than BLM ever was back then. Their mobility just didnt shine in the same contexts.

Now today though... May be another story.