BLM Rotation

[Mhaeric]

You didn't really add anything new except telling him the break point for aoe vs single target and you obviously didn't read anything the person who posted before you stating the same thing you did, by about 30min earlier. Also you spouted of the T2> T3 by using the incorrect and improper logic that I warned against in my post and gave no reason for why this faulty logic is superior.

ur pst z hrd 2 rd t4 dnt bthr

[Allyrion]

You didn't really add anything new except telling him the break point for aoe vs single target and you obviously didn't read anything the person who posted before you stating the same thing you did, by about 30min earlier. Also you spouted of the T2> T3 by using the incorrect and improper logic that I warned against in my post and gave no reason for why this faulty logic is superior.

The reason people use Thunder II is because it's assumed you always use a Thunder after Blizzard III in a single target rotation. Thunder II extends the Umbral Phase with just enough time for you to get to full mana and no more. It is also a good length by the next Umbral Phase unless you get a Firestarter like every other Fire I hit and maybe a Thundercloud proc.

Thunder fits nicely into the umbral phase. To effectively use to dot length of Thunder III, you'd need to use it in the Astral phase, otherwise you clip it and it loses its potency advantage. Thunder is just there to add some dps to the Umbral Phase and allow for Thundercloud procs. If you took it out to utilize Thunder III's full duration as a dot, you'd be losing more Fire I time because now your Thunder is out of sync with your regen phase AND you need to scathe or something while regening mana which I don't think is a better use of your time.

The regen time is a given for BLM. Using thunder makes it productive. As soon as thunder doesn't sync up with it, then you still have that regen time to fill in for and now your thunder is taking up fire time. That's not optimizing the fire time.

If you do thunder every Umbral anyway, then Thunder II is better because Thunder III will get clipped 99% of the time. The .5 second cast time is not worth the 10 potency. That's the argument, not the dot duration since focusing on the duration runs into problems I mentioned above.

[johnbeck1000]

Being new to MMO's all together with FFXIV I find all this talk about the "optimum rotations" odd....some players can come up with the best/optimum rotation on paper but IMO I have not seen the chance to have the same rotation every time because of actual battle scenarios that come up. I am only level 45 so I don't have Thunder3 or Flare but I do the best I can while trying to dodge AoE's, adds, etc and still try to maintain some sort of normal rotation that helps the party out the best way.

Allyrion, is the extra potency on a Thundercloud from T3 worth the extra half sec or is the "optimum rotation" still the main goal here by fitting T2 into the timing sequence?

Also I had a FC member tell me his rotation is F3 until MP is low and then uses F1...he told me he likes this because the crit is higher for F3. Is this taken into account on the "optimum rotation"

don't grill me too bad....

[OrionInerghem]

It really depends on what you're fighting.


In WP sometimes it's more efficient to finish off the mobs with B2, I only open up F3> Flare again if the mobs have 20-30%+ HP left, if you have a good BRD or WHM doing AoE then B2 still might be your best bet then having mobs drop off before you can re-target and try to get a flare off. All depends on the situation.

As for Raging> Quelling it depends on your chosen AoE plan, but I always make sure they're both up for my Flare> convert> Flare

As for T3 Vs. T2, For fights with a lot of movement I always swiftcast T3, T3 just gives you a few extra seconds for moving. I think it's important to always keep thunder on, and half the time It'll proc before it wears off which will reset your timer anyhow.

I never single target flare, unless I use raging> flare> convert> flare and I'm pretty sure it'll kill the boss. Hope that helps, blm is fun!!!

[Youmu]

Being new to MMO's all together with FFXIV I find all this talk about the "optimum rotations" odd....some players can come up with the best/optimum rotation on paper but IMO I have not seen the chance to have the same rotation every time because of actual battle scenarios that come up. I am only level 45 so I don't have Thunder3 or Flare but I do the best I can while trying to dodge AoE's, adds, etc and still try to maintain some sort of normal rotation that helps the party out the best way.

Allyrion, is the extra potency on a Thundercloud from T3 worth the extra half sec or is the "optimum rotation" still the main goal here by fitting T2 into the timing sequence?

Also I had a FC member tell me his rotation is F3 until MP is low and then uses F1...he told me he likes this because the crit is higher for F3. Is this taken into account on the "optimum rotation"

don't grill me too bad....

Your FC member was either trolling you or an idiot, pure F3 spam is marginally but undeniably worse than any other rotation. You use thunder2 for umbral phases, but thunder3 on proc activations for the bonus proc potency.

[Allyrion]

Being new to MMO's all together with FFXIV I find all this talk about the "optimum rotations" odd....some players can come up with the best/optimum rotation on paper but IMO I have not seen the chance to have the same rotation every time because of actual battle scenarios that come up. I am only level 45 so I don't have Thunder3 or Flare but I do the best I can while trying to dodge AoE's, adds, etc and still try to maintain some sort of normal rotation that helps the party out the best way.

Allyrion, is the extra potency on a Thundercloud from T3 worth the extra half sec or is the "optimum rotation" still the main goal here by fitting T2 into the timing sequence?

Also I had a FC member tell me his rotation is F3 until MP is low and then uses F1...he told me he likes this because the crit is higher for F3. Is this taken into account on the "optimum rotation"

don't grill me too bad....

You use Thunder III for Thundercloud procs and Thunder II when refreshing manually during the Umbral phases.

Though the tooltip gives the impression that the Thundercloud potency is determined by the dot it procced off of, this is incorrect. If you get a Thundercloud proc off Thunder II, you can use Thunder III for the proc and get full benefit of Thunder III (potency and extended durations).

This is also one of the few cases where you may have to alter your rotation as a Thunder III proc will extend for another 24 seconds. In this case, you may be better off using Scathe after Blizzard III if you think your Thunder is extended long enough to last another Fire cycle.

Optimal rotations are based on ideal circumstances, this is true. However, it's good to know how to use your class at full power and then adapt it from there.
It's also especially easy for a BLM to follow the optimal rotation since even if there's a lot of movement, you don't have many timers to monitor. In most cases, you should get roughly the same amount of Fire Is each astral phase and regen with Blizzard III --> Thunder II --> Fire III. When you move, you can usually just pick up where you left off.
It's only a pain if you lose the Astral Umbral buff completely, but I don't think this happens that often since it's very forgiving.

Fire III is not good dps because it kills your mana and it's gains in crit do not make up for it. It's not a mana efficient spell and you can only get like 3 off each Astral phase and you will never get a Firestarter proc spamming so you're not taking advantage of that trait. I'm sure PessiMistic or another better mage can show you the math that proves that Fire III spam is never optimal even with crit gains.
Though I have heard something like Flare spam working with two targets, but I've never tried it myself.

I like PuroStrider's spreadsheet which gives good comparisons on the different spells and answers some of these questions that you may have.
Here's a link to the spreadsheet and the thread.

Synovius's thread on the rotation is also helpful if you want some tips as well. Another link

The most important thing about understanding optimal rotations is not to follow them blindly but to understand how abilities rank and work together with one another. Feel free to adapt them depending on the situation but to do that, it's very helpful to understand what the ideal spell rotation is and then change it from there.

[johnbeck1000]

Your FC member was either trolling you or an idiot, pure F3 spam is marginally but undeniably worse than any other rotation. You use thunder2 for umbral phases, but thunder3 on proc activations for the bonus proc potency.

I thought he was being serious so I maybe I'm the idiot :-)

Thanks Allyrion for the helpful tips.