In defense of black mages, they had access to a multitude of spells of different elements, so there was never an excuse to not take a black mage. If the enemy was resistant to fire, the black mage would use something else.Unless they made it so it only works in open world I don't see it happening, just because....
It's nothing about stress and more about balance.
If dragoons could deal more damage to dragons, as logic dictates, how many people would have taken non-dragoon DPS to t5 back then? Or if you add certain elemental resistances, why would someone take a BLM over another DPS who can do full damage? Balance ends when people are excluded from content just for playing certain class.
The reason it's not gonna be worth making it a full fledged part of the combat design is that it will become a thing is that is gonna become a dependency for end game content, even if it's a low 1 through 3 percent increase or a 5 percent proc rate, and it becomes a hassle to develop with it in mind and a headache because of it. Developers always bring it up and end up removing it in the end overall to allow for more diversity and remove that dependency. Sadly the worst part is that the community can't be trusted with it.I guess this may just be a difference in personal preference between us then. When something's added, I like for it to be more than a gimmick. I want it to come into consideration when I consider the purpose, capabilities, and dynamics of my build (class, job, gear, materia, these traits, etc.). If it doesn't come to the point where I can say "I am... <some new or newly nuanced identity of the more general role>", I really don't care for some random shiny thing going off occasionally outside of my control.
This makes such an option very limited so that it doesn't impact the game drastically and prevents such a dependency.
As a gimmick by making it be a very low proc rate that in the off chance that it does activate then you can enjoy it going off because you chose that trait to define you. In which is more of an open world quality of life thing. Especially since you'll be more inclined to be diverse with all your jobs unless you want to force the same trait into every one of your jobs.
Bah. I get why the current in-game jobs are simplified like that, but when 3.0 comes out and new jobs come out of the woodwork, I really would like seeing some jobs that require some real intellectual stimuli. Heck, if Magus and Seer come out, I'd love them to require more technical abilities that maximize damage or healing depending on exterior, impossible to manipulate circumstances. Like "True Fire/True Fira/True Firaga -> Deals more damage to Ice-aspected enemies, halves damage to Water-aspected enemies, heals Fire-aspected enemies.", "True Cure / True Cura / True Curaga -> Heals as normal Cure / Cura / Curaga, but damages undead for same amount as healing would otherwise do."
While technically true, any mobs that resisted Thunder or Ice SEVERELY reduced BLM damage over a fight, because of how every spell in XI had different potency, and Thunder was by a wide margin their highest-damaging spell. Of course, because of how Magic Accuracy and Resistances worked, you could still luck out and get huge burst against even an Earth element mob by just having your Thunder not get resisted, but over multiple fights you lose a ton of damage to resistances and are generally better off using Aero, a significantly weaker spell.
I agree with other posters noting that adding elements for the sake of it, while flavorful, adds almost nothing to game complexity, just clutters up your spellbook. If they remade BLM and took out the astral/umbral cycle (a bad idea IMO because it's a genuinely well-sculpted take on the classic MMO turret mage) for the sake of introducing 6 different 170 potency Fire/Aero/Blizzard/Thunder/Stone/Water I spells, it's not more interesting. While I agree that it's prettier and makes the game more thematically appropriate, (shooting Fire at Ifrit feels wrong) it does nothing to make combat interesting, since you just swap out which Element I spell you're using.
Things that make games interesting: forcing players to regularly make decisions about their play mid-fight. (example: astral/umbral) Incidentally, they could even improve that further by ripping off the Arcane Mastery system from WoW, where damage is increased the closer you are to max mana. You know what's a real choice? Deciding whether to dump full MP for a Flare with massive burst, or maintaining higher DPS with Fire I spam and a Flare to finish.
You know what's not a real choice? Using Aero I/II/III against Titan just because he's Earth element, changing nothing else about your playstyle for the duration of the encounter.
(p.s. 1000 char limit is so frustrating)
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