Dear casters... about line break....

[Sleigh]

You would think Ranged LB would be stronger since Casters can accurately control where their AoE is placed and thus hit many intended targets, where Ranegd have to kind of guess.

Though I guess Casters are full DPS jobs and Ranged are DPS/Support jobs. Still, wish they gave Ranged a bit of something else then, like DoT or a status debuff to make it not completely worthless. Maybe given the DPS/support function that MCH and BRD have, making it reduce the target's damage dealt by 10% for 10 seconds would be cool and almost like a DPS/Tank hybrid LB.

Well we can at least have the discussion of groups using BLM or BRD/MCH LB with how they balanced them. If it was flipflopped in potency caster LB would be worthless (barring angles you can't hit everything) and caster LB is one of the reasons you even bring a caster in the first place.

I do wish you could aim the LB properly though, or at least see the lines.

[RiceisNice]

Well we can at least have the discussion of groups using BLM or BRD/MCH LB with how they balanced them. If it was flipflopped in potency caster LB would be worthless (barring angles you can't hit everything) and caster LB is one of the reasons you even bring a caster in the first place.

I do wish you could aim the LB properly though, or at least see the lines.

Even if caster LB was lower damage, it's effective range is just that much better that it's might as well justified for hitting all the targets. The width of ranged LB is so damn pitiful that you're bound to miss 3-4 targets in a 6+ mob pull, espesically with how they "converge and spread" onto the tank. The length amounts for nothing from a practical standpoint except for fracturnal's clockwerks and A1 (and even then caster LB is going to hit them both if you tank them on opposite sides rather than corners)

[Fevelle]

Can someone explain me how is a 6000 potency LB worse than a 5400 potency LB?

[Sleigh]

In 3+ enemy AoE, like dungeons and A2S, caster should LB, regardless of SMN or BLM, because of a few reasons, one of the most important being range and more of a cooldown period in BLM's AoE rotations. In raids, what I should have specified I was referring to when I said MCH/BRD should LB over BLM, typically caster/ranged hits a small cluster of enemies or 2 enemies, like T5, T6, T8, T9, T12, A3, and range isn't really in the equation.

[Xisin]

ranged lb is 10% less potency than caster lb. average meteor does around 47k average ranged lb does around 43k. So the cost of using ranged lb is about 8-10k worth of damage. Both bard and mch can and should be doing their dps + lb + a supporting feature such as foe or w/e. Blm can easily make the dps up, this should be a common sense thing with the numbers given here. But if you wish I can show you those values too. In other words the opportunity cost of the blm limit breaking (huge lb lock animation, we're frozen until far after the meteor animation ends.) So to time out my limit break lock I went to my youtube channel and watched my first a3 clear. Here is how the lb went down: start channeling meteor @ 6:39. meteor finishes channeling at 6:43. I'm locked into animation until 6:52. I am unable to cast ANYTHING for aprox. 12 seconds. In that time I can get in 4 globals. To be precise 3 fire 4s and a fire 1. This is about 17k damage if I do not get a single crit (est. fire 4 at 4800 and Fire 1 at 3k Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H7HGsEWo4L4


So the question is then, can the brd and mch do more than 17k damage in that 12 second window, excluding damage they could be doing while in LB? my answer is no.


For reference here is the MCH lb: starts at 3, channel finishes at 7, no longer locked at 12. They are locked for 9 seconds total.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3ryEcp7UM7I


Here is the BRD LB: Starts channel @9, finishes channel @ 13, unlocked @ 18. Again 9 seconds.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w2Spu6JxtzA





LB priority order for 2 targets are as follows:

SMN > BRD> MCH > BLM


For 3 targets or more


SMN > BLM > BRD > MCH


LB priority for 1 target...


you melees sort it out.


There are your numbers. BLM limit break does a total of 8k~ more than a bard lb but lose one more global than a bard does while lbing, which is around 4800 damage by itself. They also lose the opportunity cost of casting during the limit break, as well as enochian up time. The true values of the lb on 2 targets are: bard lb: 86,000/9 = 9555 dps. Caster LB = 94,000/12 which is 7833 dps. huh, look at that. Physical Ranged dps LB is designed FOR 2 targets.

[Sleigh]

Good testing[/B]

That's good to know, I knew the animation lock was less on BRD but I never checked to see if the time difference was there. Assumed same cast time.

Not just a time difference, or just the DPS difference on what a BRD/MCH can do vs BLM, it's also the big fact that an LB impacts them differently. BLM is the highest per GCD attacker in the entire game, oGCD buffs and attacks are small and spaced wide apart. In contrast, MCH/BRD derive a LARGE part of their DPS from DoTs, oGCD buffs, and oGCD attacks, and in MCH's case, turret damage. When you're talking about a 10~ second period of immobility between the two, you're basically saying, MCH 123 or BRD Heavy Shots with nothing vs BLM regular rotations with nothing, and we're talking 2k~ more per GCD easily. Then when MCH or BRD are done, their ramp-up is limited if any at all, while BLM mandatory has to at best do a slow, weak no-AF F3 to get back into the game.

It's just no contest, as much no contest as talking about SMN LBing vs anyone in AoE situations. BLM sucks at LBing on two targets now, assuming range isn't an issue.

[SilverRhyme]

This is a little off tangent to the last few pages, but isn't this topic kinda done?
The TC hasn't even spoken once after being corrected about Caster LB vs Ranged DPS LB damage.