Elemental Spell Reform

[Estellios]

I actually enjoy the fact that my spells are not carbon copies of each other with just a different graphic. All my spells have a distinct use a purpose, over just using the element that kill the monster the fastest. I also hated when games filled the mage's spell book with useless crap and outdated spells. All of my spells have a use and I have no fluff spells. The Black Mage core spells have always been fire, ice ,and thunder and thats what I have... I don't see a problem.

White Mages even had aero and stone before, in FFIII. So they brought back something from an old FF. It make more sense, to me, since our white mages are not 'divine' priest types. They are more elemental-druid types.

Ifrit is weak to wind, yet we are not stacking CNJs to kill him and lightning work just fine on him. I'm not really worried about my limited ice spell selection on the next primal.

This guy gets it.

Not giving BLM/THM everything under the sun gives more room for more classes/jobs in the future, ones that specialize in different elements or different effects with existing elements. It's better for the game to have more than 1 attack magic Job in the long run. FYI you will still hit Garuda for neutral damage with Thunder just like Ifrit (who you do great damage to), and you are going to absolutely slaughter Leviathan and Shiva when they are released.

It's the same reason why WHM doesn't have a ton of support barring a couple spells, so they can release a class and job for it that specializes in it instead of having 1 person that can do everything.

[Enfarious]

This guy gets it.

Not giving BLM/THM everything under the sun gives more room for more classes/jobs in the future, ones that specialize in different elements or different effects with existing elements. It's better for the game to have more than 1 attack magic Job in the long run. FYI you will still hit Garuda for neutral damage with Thunder just like Ifrit (who you do great damage to), and you are going to absolutely slaughter Leviathan and Shiva when they are released.

It's the same reason why WHM doesn't have a ton of support barring a couple spells, so they can release a class and job for it that specializes in it instead of having 1 person that can do everything.

Not giving the job that as per the lore specializes in elemental magic access to all elements makes sense?

Don't give whm everything, give it what makes sense, banish line of spells, pro/shell(I know it used to be there they removed it blah blah), cures, raises, status removals. Not elemental nukes, not bar-elements, not debuffs.

There's still plenty of room for other jobs that use elements in different ways, that focus on buffs and debuffs.

Saying, "Hmm let's call this the elemental mage, we should let it cast fire and ummmmmm what's another element?"
"Oh I know, thunder. That should make it a very well rounded 'Elemental Specialist' class that really utilizes the elements to dole out damage and can always find the enemies elemental weakness(assuming they have one)."
"Wait don't we have 6 elements, and then light and dark to boot?"
"Oh yeah, let's just toss a couple on whm, that'll make it gooder."
"Ok now that we've really fleshed out these awesome mage classes let's get to work on some EG content that requires people to class stack for the best times, cause racing is what people play RPGs for right?"

Does none of that look horribly wrong, cause really it's the conversation I say having taken place at some point, the one where someone should have stepped in and said, "Quite smoking that shit at work! Now find someone to rethink all of these ideas and get it right."

[Razen_Arghast]

This guy gets it.

Not giving BLM/THM everything under the sun gives more room for more classes/jobs in the future, ones that specialize in different elements or different effects with existing elements. It's better for the game to have more than 1 attack magic Job in the long run. FYI you will still hit Garuda for neutral damage with Thunder just like Ifrit (who you do great damage to), and you are going to absolutely slaughter Leviathan and Shiva when they are released.

It's the same reason why WHM doesn't have a ton of support barring a couple spells, so they can release a class and job for it that specializes in it instead of having 1 person that can do everything.

Yes slaughter Leviathan and all but what happens when you go fight Quetzalcoatl/Ixion/Ramuh? Use the MP inneficient Fire combo? Spam Fire only (1 spell)?

The way this design is heading Blm can be totally shut down from content by design alone and there's nothing a player can do to change that via skillful play. It's poor design by default if you go like that and it might work somewhat now, when we have that little content, but it will get borked in the future. The reform was short-sighted to begin with.

Biggest appeal for me (and I bet lots of other Black Mages) was the option to play around the elemental wheel and the monster elements. It was my job to know what element every mob type was weak to and strong to and cast accordingly and now it's "steamlined" and boring.

Oh and, "Switch to another Job for the Thunder Primal" does not and never will cut it as an answer. The game might promote multi-job characters but in the end you still have your main. The one you like to play and chose to play. And having your main shut out from content because of mechanics design alone is just fail. This also applies to all the STUPIDLY melee-punishing content we have right now but thats a discussion for another thread.