Make Blizzard IV instant. Here's why:

[Yeldir]

There is no reason for Black Mage to be this frustrating to play. Black Mage is not a class that has best in raid damage balanced by a tricky mechanic.

It is an adequate damage class, easily inferior to, say, the Dragoon, and easily superior to, say, Bards and Machinists, at present. I don't think I need or should do more damage than a dragoon. I'm content to trail a Dragoon of equal skill by 50 dps, or so.

.. Or I would be, if Enochian didn't cause me such constant, mouth-foaming nerd rage by virtue of the incredibly fickle Blizzard IV.

To those of you who don't know and don't care, here's a bullet list of things that will cut your Black Mage's damage down from "worse than your Dragoon" to "possibly worse than your Bard" for a whopping thirty seconds:

• A boss disappears, canceling Blizzard IV
• The Black Mage is forced by a raid mechanic to move during a crucial Blizzard IV cast
• The Black Mage is incapacitated by a raid mechanic during or before a Blizzard IV cast
• A boss turns invulnerable just as Blizzard IV lands
• Due to one of the above factors, Astral Ice wears off During a Blizzard IV cast
• Due to one of the above factors, Enochian wears off during a Blizzard IV cast

herubledur sounds like you're not very good at black mage my friend hahahaha
There is a limit to individual skill when faced by randomized mechanics. A good Black Mage compensates for this by playing conservatively, weaving whatever instant casts he can with movement, firing off that second Blizzard IV a step earlier in his rotation, and generally anticipating at what points an encounter can disrupt the re-application of Enochian.

But sometimes you just get hosed - you're singled out for AOE's consecutively. Maybe Manipulator decides he's going to quarantine you every single time that fight. Maybe the tornado spawns under your butt and juggles you, helplessly. We've all been there. What does that do most dps classes? Interrupts their rotation, forcing them to start from scratch.

What if you weren't allowed to start from scratch? What if you were forced to play exclusively with your 2.0 toolkit for a full thirty seconds? That's what happens to a Black Mage who is locked out of reapplying their Enochian buff by random mechanics. They're not allowed to start over.

...

Do I think that punishment mechanic should go away? No. What needs to go away is weaving valiantly between aoes, juggling mechanics, and then, on the line, banging off a Blizzard IV that should have successfully refreshed Enochian had the server not ticked off Astral Ice III a tenth of a second sooner than my client.

That's pure rage. And it happens constantly. The best laid plans, and all that. It needs to go away, and an instant Blizzard IV is the best way to do it. Give it a cooldown, reduce the damage - whatever. Just make it so that if I press that god damned button, I get my Enochian refreshed. Period.

[zcrash970]

I agree with a reduce cast time but not instant. I think that would cut many of the issues a lot of BLMs are complaining about.

[Seadle]

Welllllllll, we got this skill at level 26, it's called Swiftcast, I mean if you aren't using it in your rotation already(bad BLM if you aren't) but sometimes you save it for an emergency. Unless you were too busy foaming from your mouth. Also, if you are having problems with quarantine on A4, Blizz 3 has a 1/2 cast time while under Astral 3 and you can also cast while "landing/falling", same with tornadoes and other toss-up mechanics. Even with the cast time of Blizz 4 when I do anything that has a mechanic which stops the fight I learn when the enemy becomes nontargetable and destroy my TAB key, transpose and smash my Blizz 4 key. I think you summed it up pretty good, "herubledur sounds like you're not very good at black mage my friend hahahaha". There is also fun you can do with your buffs, i.e, do what I do cast Fire 4 x1 > Sharp > Fire 4x2 > Fire1 > Fire 3x1 > Convert > Fire 3x2 > F3 Proc With that after the F1 gets done casting it will say Astral Fire 3 dropped, but it will continue with Astral Fire 3. The same can be done with Blizz 4 If your animation has began "when your BLM pushes their arms forward" and the buff drops you will get it back.

[Yeldir]

That's your rebuttal? "if u don't like it, its because your bad hahahaa".

I get one swiftcast per sixty-second Enochian, and I need to land two B4's to keep the train on its tracks. I'd go so far as to say that if you're including swift in a static rotation in a fight that you know can force-cancel a Blizzard IV cast by chance, you're the bad black mage.

I generally open with sharp, so I can preserve swiftcast for emergencies, with the exception of crap like hunts where I don't need the cast insurance. If you're not opening with sharp in fights where you know you may be locked out of a B4, you're automatically bad, because you're burning swift on the F3 opener. All of the theorycrafting I've seen done on the F3 open gives it a very small front-end increase in immediate damage by getting you to your F4 spam a few seconds sooner, with no meaningful increase in overall damage - you're still firing off the exact same number of F4's.

Which brings me to "cast Fire 4 x1 > Sharp > Fire 4x2 > Fire1 > Fire 3x1 > Convert > Fire 3x2 > F3 Proc", which is one of the most counterproductive rotations I've ever laid eyes on. You're burning both swiftcast and convert, two of your most valuable "oh dear god I'm about to lose Enochian" tools, losing a cast of F4 in your rotation, and delaying getting back into those juicy F4's, to do WHAT? Cast two more F3's??

Can somebody else slap this guy for me? I don't think he's going to take it seriously unless a couple of us do it, together.

[Elky]

I've been cut off using BlizIV with Swiftcast, the chracter animation will come out but if I start Swiftcasting at 1second it won't get the spell off in time, thus wasting Swiftcast cooldown and now your in an awkward stage in your rotation. So it is kind of frustrating. I'm frustrated in general by Enochian, although I have gotten better at managing it, but still its meh.

[Serrow]

I feel like Astral Fire and Umbral Ice should just have their duration extended by 2-3 seconds, along with whatever change is coming to bring Thunder spells back into our rotations. In a dream world, I'd like to see the extension of the timers and Thunder perhaps interfacing with Enochian to some extent, either extending its duration or offering some other kind of tangible benefit for its usage that doesn't come back to bite us in the ass five seconds later as it currently does.

What I will say regardless of all else: I have had few experiences in gaming that can compare to the frustration of a Blizzard IV cast cancelling at 0.02 seconds.

[RiceisNice]

...

It should function similar to monk's GL3. That is, it'll refresh the duration to its proper value even if it falls off. Monks have about a one second buffer window where they'd be able to refresh the duration on GL if it falls off.

That's how I see it anyway. You have the same circumstances as a monk when it comes to using (or losing if mechanics get in teh way) enochian, so I'd think its only fair that you have the same restrictions and same accommodations (that is, having some buffer to refresh enochian or getting a cast as it falls off).

Thundercloud should also be adjusted a bit so its more feasiable, either a potency boost or oGCD as a proc (think the latter is a much better option that won't get in the way too much of enochian). It'd also be much better for most classes if the game could be much more reactive in regards to procs and cast animation.

[Waliel]

It should function similar to monk's GL3. That is, it'll refresh the duration to its proper value even if it falls off. Monks have about a one second buffer window where they'd be able to refresh the duration on GL if it falls off.

It only looks like that because you actually refresh GL when you press the button, but the floating text comes only after the whole animation is finished.

[RiceisNice]

It only looks like that because you actually refresh GL when you press the button, but the floating text comes only after the whole animation is finished.

Which honestly should be the case for most attacks that grant you a buff (esp proc ones such as firestarter, straighter shot, BotD combos) It'd make so many things less frustrating, not just monk at this point.

[Dami]

• A boss disappears, canceling Blizzard IV
• The Black Mage is forced by a raid mechanic to move during a crucial Blizzard IV cast
• The Black Mage is incapacitated by a raid mechanic during or before a Blizzard IV cast
• A boss turns invulnerable just as Blizzard IV lands
• Due to one of the above factors, Astral Ice wears off During a Blizzard IV cast
• Due to one of the above factors, Enochian wears off during a Blizzard IV cast

Yeah let's pretend all of these problems do not affect other DPS classes as well. Boss goes missing? GL3 drops,twin drops. bye bye 42% damage and 0.4sec GCD reduction. BoTD drops, byebye 270 potency. Huton drops.

And let's pretend other DPS classes do not have to move in-between rotations to avoid boss mechanics. I don't see blms complaining in Ravana EX when they can just stand there and dps like nobody's business during warlord shell phases or during any of the seeing ___ phases.