Why is Light and Dark damage so rare?

[Anonymoose]

The elemental system of XIV has always been well-rooted in the lore, but it's always been a mess in terms of game mechanics. Banish (Astral) and Scourge (Umbral) are the old basis of Thaumaturge (before BLM came in and forced Conjurer to split the elements with it).

If you want to be a purist about it, Astral and Umbral aren't aspects at all, they're polarities. Polarities exist in all things. The elemental wheel as a whole is divided (3 Astral / 3 Umbral) but any of those elements can also be affected by Astral or Umbral energies.

But here's where it get awkward: Astral damage used to be Wind / Lightning \ Fire in equal measure, Umbral was Water \ Ice / Earth. Sometimes Light and Dark seem to work like Astral and Umbral mechanically, and sometimes not. The difference, if indeed there is one, is pretty murky at the moment (As far as I know, anyway).

I assume that's why they just leave it as Unaspected, lol. (Not that Elemental Aspect really counts for anything mechanically, anyway.)

[Kotemon]

The elemental system of XIV has always been well-rooted in the lore, but it's always been a mess in terms of game mechanics.

Don't forget the Materia and elemental affinity/resistance, Most gear cant handle it with all the other stat Materia to choose from. Then there is the notion that status effects are also related to specific elements. The gist of what I heard was Black Mage would be useless against Ifrit because if the elemental system worked they would deal little damage or heal Ifrit. In that sense it messes up their rotations if they are not against an opposing element. While White mage has Water, Earth, and Wind but cant be effective as both healer and DPS. Not without removing physical DPS to have extra healers to be a lesser DPS compared to Black Mage. Making a scenario where people will exclude specific jobs for specific content or reject people because they done have the right/enough elemental affinity for that encounter. Then there's having to go back and redo them all every time there is a specific need to.

But in all honesty, the only place where an elemental wheel would work is with crafting. As each Crafting Job tends to have a specific element affinity for the majority of recipies and a lesser secondary. I can see elemental stats applied to tools and job specific gear but it would require a rotational overhaul to make it work and have any meaningful influence to Brands, Names, Durability, Quality, progress, conserving crystals. While things like Light and Darkness can be left for combat spells. As it is now Unaspected spells are like saying astral is used to create these elemental magics, while Umbral is used for these. The game just lacks any kind of "verses" between the two outside of lore, and probably for the better.