Casters got actually a buff

[sylvestew]

lol casters got a buff, what!! >.< I dont get the logic smn got a straight nerf with no thunder, blizz 2 lol and blm got nerf with scathe even if it was only used for situations where needing to move and keep dps up. Just dont see the logic.

[T0rin]

SMN lost Thunder but it can be replaced with 2 Ruin II (same cast+gcd time, less damage if no crit, same damage if crits, more burst damage and blind), and got Blizzard II for semi-decent AOE rotation with Shadow Flare, Miasma II, Bane and Blizzard II. Maybe now it's useful for content that need AOE damage, since Shadow Flare + Miasma II + Blizzard II + Pet will be pretty good. That's a useful replacement for Tri-Disaster (that still is a disaster).

Please tell me you aren't serious here.

Thunder is 210 potency over 18 seconds for 212 MP and requires 1 GCD. That is 0.9906 potency per mana.

Since you obviously don't know how Ruin and Ruin II even work, I'll explain. They're the exact same potency. They have the exact same effective cool-down. Ruin II requires 133 mana and gives a blind, Ruin takes 79 mana and requires a cast time.

DoTs can crit. Thunder ticks can crit. Ruin can crit. Ruin II can crit. There is no difference there.

All this is doing, is swapping 1 casting of Thunder every 18-33 seconds for 1 casting of Ruin.

So, we're losing 130 potency every 18 seconds and we're saving 133 MP. I don't know how you think Ruin II actually works, or why you would actually be suggesting that it is remotely a replacement for losing Thunder from our DoT rotation, but you really need to learn how the game works before you attempt to downplay what is essentially a major loss to SMN DPS.

[Tercino]

2 times Ruin II takes 2GDC and Thunder takes 1 GDC+2.5 cast time = 2GDC.

Reading this you clearly have never played a mage class, at least in 2.0. The Thunder cast time overlaps the GCD, meaning that Thunder only takes 1 GCD instead of the 2 for Ruin 2. Ruin 2 is also considered poor because it costs more mp than Ruin with the only added benefits being blind and the ability to cast while moving.

If you don't understand the most basic class mechanics please don't try and comment, it's not helpful to anyone.

[Shadowsend]

Bane is what really put me over the edge...I can deal with not having thunder. But why leave the Bane cap at 3...Have to burn 2 stacks of atherflow just to get DOTs on a large group. No other Job/Class to my knowledge has an AoE ability that is capped on the amount of enemies it can hit. If BLM could only hit 4 targets with an AoE they would be raging all over the place. Was hoping for a better upgrade for Bane, but this is just meh...