Geomancer and Time Mage Ideas

[MartaDemireux]

- Fire Mechanic : 1 rank of fire will remove the most recent stack of any debuff.

Ah, must have been your terminology. A stack is something there can be multiples of. For instance Defiance builds stacks of Wrath. Having multiple debuffs are just called debuffs. Some bosses give a debuff that builds stacks. That's what I thought you were referring to.

You'll see when you level your THM higher that Blizzard III actually immediately gives you III stacks of Umbral Ice. The same goes for Fire III. I didn't read anywhere in your post about altering the mechanic.

So with this in mind, you'd only ever use Fire III to remove multiple debuffs and then either transpose back to Ice or toss a Blizzard III to heal someone. You'd have to tie in some sort of a mechanic to remove X amount of debuffs based on how many stacks of AF you have, not on the actual tier. Before AF is taken into account Fire 1 would be used to cleans 1 debuff, Fire 2 would cleans 1 debuff in an AoE (since normally its AoE) and Fire 3 to remove 2 debuffs from a target. With AF the MP costs are doubled for fire spells so you could justify the higher cost in increasing stacks. 1 stack adds 1 debuff removed per spell, essentially retaining its normal potency buff. I don't think you want to double the fire costs further, though, as AF already does that. With AF at level 50 your Fire 1 is 638MP, 2 is 850, 3 is 1064. Under UI your Fire spells are about half their normal cost. Under AF your ice spells are reduced in cost by about half as well.

The real issue with the mechanic though is UI. UI3 recovers like 2k MP per tic. This is why I say they'll be able to cure non stop with no regard to MP and would make them the go-to healer if you had a long fight. You'll either have to make the amount cured be very small to justify the spamming (which simply doubling potencies would do) or make the enmity costs higher to impose a risk of spamming. The problem then is having a cure strong enough to top off a tank that just ate a strong attack.

Continuum should be a stance but it needs to be able to be removed. As already covered, the CNJ gets Cleric Stance so that it may do respectable damage solo or in non-crucial moments. TIM is stemming from a DPS class so you have a couple of options here:

A) It could get the same treatment as SCH in that it's automatically in a healing stance when the soul is equipped. Cleric Stance is equipped and used as needed when damage needs to be done. It would mean no change to THM spells and instead getting all heals and utility spells from cross-classing or as job abilities.
B) It could get a healing stance similar to how a tank needs a tanking stance. This would change its attacks into heals and utility abilities.

Your Continuum would fall under option B. WHM's pop CS and then toss on some DoT's or Holy a group of enemies down fast. SCH's pop CS and toss on some DoT's and Bane 3 other enemies. Why should TIM be gimped in the same practice? Turn on Continuum to heal, turn it off to drop some Fire II's. You'd still have your Thunder line of spells as well as Thunderstorm procs in between cures just as the other healers have access to their nukes without Cleric Stance but deal less damage. Or make it so all heals are learned from the job/cross classing and let them equip Cleric Stance.

A good thing to ask yourself here is: How will the TIM be able to kill their job quest monsters and keep themselves or others healed at the same time? The WHM quests as an example involve both healing others and making use of attacking enemies to teach you that there are times when a good nuke will be more beneficial than a heal.

[LadyVaJedi]

To me the Geo. Should have a spell list based on the four elements. Earth, fire, and water

[Ehayte]

Snip

RE: Fire - Yes, that is a better idea, the amount of debuffs removed (sorry, I was using EQ1 terminology "stack") should be based on the stacks of AF you carry ( : D ). And yes, I would envision only Fire II and Fire III being used. By the by, I do have a higher level BLM, I have it on a different char to double up on Mytho generation.

RE: UI3 - Yeah, I would imagine that the potencies are decreased, AND the enmities are increased. The main thing the class is lacking is an "Oh SH*T" heal. I suppose Blizzard III could do that, but you don't really have any consequences for using it, since you have unlimited mana. With double potency and 1.25 enmity, you could spam BIII to recover a big hit, then toss BIs out to sustain, combined with a 50%+ up time on rewind. Good point, there would need to be some tweaking. I am liking my own TIM less and less as I think more about the implementation. I think its possible and would be fun, but just like my MYS it would be hard to balance and implement.

RE: Continuum - You're right, I would probably put a SHORTER CD on it than Cleric Stance, as you have NO healing capability outside of Continuum, and if you are specced for healing, its not like your FireIIs are going to be doing massive damage.

[Ehayte]

To me the Geo. Should have a spell list based on the four elements. Earth, fire, and water

That's three . . .

Also, Fire Ice and Lightening are taken by the THM, and the game recognizes 6 elements, Fire, Ice, Lightning, Water, Earth, Wind. From the CNJ class skills, you get access to Wind, Earth, and Water attacks, so GEO would use those. Also, Geomancers traditionally work in the realm of Earth, as they are not Elemental Sorcerers, but they are more like Earth mages.

[LadyVaJedi]

I forgot to type air. Silly me. True. There should be at least a mage that deals with the elements only.

[Kitru]

There should be at least a mage that deals with the elements only.

As said before, the game doesn't recognize only the 4 traditional elements that the Greeks identified. The game recognizes the 6 elements that the FF series has used over the course of time, which is why BLM gets half and CNJ gets the other half.