Please reconsider 7.0 BLM changes

[Galvuu]

The irony is other posters saying good luck doing x or y mechanic without non standard so.. you guys need to agree on how non mandatory it is or not. The intended design and gameplay of the job being incapable of handling such situations is a bad thing, I don't think it meant non std had to die but std had to be adjusted and if it means non std changes with it then fine imo. Why would you hamstring a job for the 1% of players who use that playstyle? BLM is not getting much consideration when they are making the fights but they obviously realise how it is now is not acceptable.

Y'all need to make up your minds if non std is mandatory or not cause you all contradict each other. If the content needs non std to complete x mechanic then guess what it's mandatory.

Two feelings are being conflated in many posts: what feels good to play and what is required to play.
For the almost entirety of the game, non-standard is not mandatory. Standard is fine and can hit 98%ish of the damage a "perfect" non-standard BLM has (non-standard pushed to that degree has an element of risk, too, since mistakes can be quite punishing).
Then there's TOP p1 and p6. Can you clear those two with standard? Yep. It just feels awful. Like, genuinely frustratingly bad. And your damage output is way lower in those two phases. When I say "have fun doing TOP p6 in DT" I don't mean it's mathematically impossible, I mean it'll feel horrid and your damage will be much lower than EW.
Fight design is extremely unkind to BLM as of late (many two minutes have bursts of movement in them- case in point, there's a Ley Lines in TOP where you get literally 3/4 gcds under it and then run around because of Wave Cannon). DT changes just make the standard rotation slightly clunkier too. So, if another fight like TOP rolls around, you're just gonna feel awful. The versatility you had to tackle that type of mechanical movement is gone. So now you just get to feel bad. Can you clear? With enough effort and attempts, anything is possible. I'll just hate myself through the journey

[HikariKurosawa]

Two feelings are being conflated in many posts: what feels good to play and what is required to play.
For the almost entirety of the game, non-standard is not mandatory. Standard is fine and can hit 98%ish of the damage a "perfect" non-standard BLM has (non-standard pushed to that degree has an element of risk, too, since mistakes can be quite punishing).
Then there's TOP p1 and p6. Can you clear those two with standard? Yep. It just feels awful. Like, genuinely frustratingly bad. And your damage output is way lower in those two phases. When I say "have fun doing TOP p6 in DT" I don't mean it's mathematically impossible, I mean it'll feel horrid and your damage will be much lower than EW.
Fight design is extremely unkind to BLM as of late (many two minutes have bursts of movement in them- case in point, there's a Ley Lines in TOP where you get literally 3/4 gcds under it and then run around because of Wave Cannon). DT changes just make the standard rotation slightly clunkier too. So, if another fight like TOP rolls around, you're just gonna feel awful. The versatility you had to tackle that type of mechanical movement is gone. So now you just get to feel bad. Can you clear? With enough effort and attempts, anything is possible. I'll just hate myself through the journey

It's a skill issue. The irony of people who claim non-standard is so hard is that they dread playing black mage the way it is intended to be played and for what makes it truly hard: turret style caster that has mastery of fight mechanic timing and knows exactly where to position at all times.

Maybe you'll just play pictomancer because it's more to your speed?

[Galvuu]

It's a skill issue. The irony of people who claim non-standard is so hard is that they dread playing black mage the way it is intended to be played and for what makes it truly hard: turret style caster that has mastery of fight mechanic timing and knows exactly where to position at all times.

Maybe you'll just play pictomancer because it's more to your speed?

I'm going to regret addressing you- especially when you're just blatantly insulting me again, and what I'm about to say cannot possibly sound anything other than conceited (and I apologize to everyone else for it in advance), but I want to make this clear for the sake and context of my other posts.
I have a lot- and I mean a lot- of experience in what would be called "standard Black Mage" by modern sensibilities. I played Black Mage for a lot of Heavensward (alongside Scholar) and a lot of Black Mage during Stormblood (alongside Bard).
I cleared UCoB in Stormblood using exclusively Black Mage, and I was one of the first few to do it (in fact, when I cleared UCoB on BLM, there were less than 50 recorded kills in the funny spreadsheet website), and my reclear got a very shiny number too.
So I know what "standard" BLM plays like on difficult content where you need to move around, and how to make it work there. I don't think I'm the best BLM in the world or anything like that, but I do think, by virtue of my unhealthy FFXIV playtime and enjoyment of high-end content and optimization, that I speak with some degree of knowledge and experience about the job and the endgame of XIV throughout its different eras in general.

If you're going to blatantly attack me to try and diminish my points, at least do your homework and check the aforementioned funny spreadsheet site, including the historical data dating all the way back to Heavensward.
Either way, if you have any substantive input, consider writing that instead of gratuitously insulting me in a public forum. Have a nice day.

[Reinhardt_Azureheim]

The irony is other posters saying good luck doing x or y mechanic without non standard so.. you guys need to agree on how non mandatory it is or not. The intended design and gameplay of the job being incapable of handling such situations is a bad thing, I don't think it meant non std had to die but std had to be adjusted and if it means non std changes with it then fine imo. Why would you hamstring a job for the 1% of players who use that playstyle? BLM is not getting much consideration when they are making the fights but they obviously realise how it is now is not acceptable.

Y'all need to make up your minds if non std is mandatory or not cause you all contradict each other. If the content needs non std to complete x mechanic then guess what it's mandatory.

Simply put, in somewhere 97-99% of cases, Standard is sufficient if not ideal and in the remaining cases, non-standard is helpful if not kinda needed to deal with specific mechanics - something you see primarily in ultimates or fights with extensive movement phases. It is a fraction of content that greatly benefits of having it - this does not make it mandatory for the average joe Black Mage player and most content, contrary what players like the one I quoted seem to misunderstand.

In very short - it is not mandatory at all in most content, but it is borderline mandatory for dealing with a handful of mechanics in this game without significant DPS loss. That's the difference.

[HikariKurosawa]

I'm going to regret addressing you- especially when you're just blatantly insulting me again, and what I'm about to say cannot possibly sound anything other than conceited (and I apologize to everyone else for it in advance), but I want to make this clear for the sake and context of my other posts.
I have a lot- and I mean a lot- of experience in what would be called "standard Black Mage" by modern sensibilities. I played Black Mage for a lot of Heavensward (alongside Scholar) and a lot of Black Mage during Stormblood (alongside Bard).
I cleared UCoB in Stormblood using exclusively Black Mage, and I was one of the first few to do it (in fact, when I cleared UCoB on BLM, there were less than 50 recorded kills in the funny spreadsheet website), and my reclear got a very shiny number too.
So I know what "standard" BLM plays like on difficult content where you need to move around, and how to make it work there. I don't think I'm the best BLM in the world or anything like that, but I do think, by virtue of my unhealthy FFXIV playtime and enjoyment of high-end content and optimization, that I speak with some degree of knowledge and experience about the job and the endgame of XIV throughout its different eras in general.

If you're going to blatantly attack me to try and diminish my points, at least do your homework and check the aforementioned funny spreadsheet site, including the historical data dating all the way back to Heavensward.
Either way, if you have any substantive input, consider writing that instead of gratuitously insulting me in a public forum. Have a nice day.

Imagine taking it so personally when someone says "skill issue" after you explicitly state that you have a skill issue. The frailty of the ego is laughable.

"So, if another fight like TOP rolls around, you're just gonna feel awful. The versatility you had to tackle that type of mechanical movement is gone. So now you just get to feel bad. Can you clear? With enough effort and attempts, anything is possible. I'll just hate myself through the journey "

This is literally a skill issue.

I'm not attacking you, I'm not insulting you, I'm just saying, get good.

[Ramiee]

....

I agree that I think the problem is as simple as the burst meta just doesn't synergize with Black mage fundamentally. Black mage only had a burst back in HW and for the 6 years afterwards it has been a sustain damage class.
You can't mold BLM into a burst job because it has had so many patches worth of work to make it play a open rotation. It was never "abuse" to play non-standard it was just adjusting the rotation. It's like how Bard has been a job that should never of been burst oriented has become a complete mess and is rare to see because it never ever suited being anything more than a sustained damage job. The only way to "fix" BLM is to do a Summoner and completely remake the class.

Non-standard won't be erased because there will always be times in a fight where you have to sacrifice something in for either damage, movement or to adjust for downtime. Non-standard won't ever go it'll just feel infinitely worse to do. Even UI paradox going removes it's class fantasy, it's a ice and fire spell not a fire spell.
It's not like the removal of mana tick destroys the ability to do non-standard it's just that the job design team did it in the worst possible way.

I don't like this half-ass approach they did, if they truly hated non-standard they should of fixed the job from the ground up to never ever need it but they haven't. The job will now become even less approachable because of the horrible levelling experience with the new mana regen system, BLM players will probably move over to Picto or play the game far less and the community built around BLM will lose a lynchpin that led to a sense of community in the job. I would of preferred a complete summoner obliteration of Black Mage because I could simply move on knowing that the job has been made for someone else and not me but these changes feel like I'm being teased, it feels like the developers want to punish me for trying to be more creative in my play style.

[Ramiee]

falling for bait

Don't bother they're baiting you. Just ignore them lol.

[Galvuu]

Don't bother they're baiting you. Just ignore them lol.

Your words are brimming with wisdom, friend... that's what I get for posting this late at night, my judgment is faltering due to exhaustion -.-

[lifd]

The irony of people who claim non-standard is so hard is that they dread playing black mage the way it is intended to be played and for what makes it truly hard: turret style caster that has mastery of fight mechanic timing and knows exactly where to position at all times.

It's quite ironic reading this when in another post (Positionals vs Damage over Time) you flat out say you don't use positionals because I quote : I play video games to have fun, I don't find positionals fun or rewarding in any way. Why would I do something I don't find enjoyable for a miniscule gain of 1.9% potency? I will do me, and you can do you. Some people are less submissive than others.

https://forum.square-enix.com/ffxiv/...50#post6482250

Which is literally you, telling everyone that you don't play your class as intended by the devs. I guess the devs need to force people to use positionals by making skills that have a positional property be unusable when you're not positioned ? since it's not the intended usage. I usual never interact on the forum (only lurk & read) but with this amount of bad faith I had to call you out on it. It is quite the entertaining reading throughout the week either way.

Regarding the actual changes : No matter if people like or dislike the changes & new additions, they just seem clucky and half backed (at least from the media tour). From the whole umbral soul situation, manafront being pretty much guarantee to drift, the whole lvl 100 optimal AoE rotation completely skipping HF II & HB II (based on Eksu Plosion theory crafting) and being completely unintuitive, to the fire phase being tighter than ever (and probably more that i missed). If their goal was to make the class more accessible they completely missed the mark and caught the vets in the process.

As a side note : Regarding all the people mentioning non-standard shouldn't be thing since it was not "intended" by the dev, it's just emergent gameplay. It's just the byproduct of having skills that you can use in different order & different situation, i'd even argue that blm is quite the embodiment of this concept. The whole class wouldn't function without that concept, because if you would always follow the same rotation a.k.a use your Triplecast/Xenoglosys/Sharpcast at the same place in your rotation not matter what fight, the class wouldn't be considered viable for endgame content & for low end content, it would be just a pain, where you'd have entire phases where you would be doing nothing or scathe spam. So it's quite funny seing people talking about "intended way of playing the class" when the class revolves around pre-planning & adaptation (a.k.a emergent gameplay).

[Kabooa]

As a reminder, you can just ignore someone by going to their profile.