Black Mage

[Altera]

Just remove Scathe, Freeze, Blizzard 2 and Sleep and give us these spells and utilties and we can be useable again xD
These spells was part of THM/BLM in 1.0 XIV

[EllieShadeflare]

I feel like I keep turning into a broken record the longer I return to this thread but from my experiences with the class, from 2.5 to now, Black Mage's identity once YoshiP fully took the reins was for the class to be a near-virgin level pure DPS... an identity it embraced quite nicely in ARR, an identity it maintained in HW as well as it could and one that Stormblood now kinda devalues.

And yeah, while it's easier to see value in White Mage as a "pure healer" or Paladin as a "pure tank" and balance them as such, a "pure DPS" appears to be an utter nightmare to balance, especially when dealing with classes with utility and support abilities... and nearly everyone BUT Black Mage has support of some kind. Granted, Samurai is pretty close with its semi-selfish "slashing resist down" ability, but it does show a bit of the problem when it came to balancing Black Mage.

YoshiP didn't fully embrace the idea that "because Black Mage can only get support if they use cross role unlike literally every other DPS in the game, this puts us in a very big issue where we lack the ability to actually compare to the other classes in terms of contributions beyond damage... but now that Summoner hits as hard as we do and HIGHER, either Summoner needs to be nerfed, or Black Mage needs to be buffed.

Altera makes an interesting point with both good and bad, and I'll address both sides.

The good is that we know that Scathe, Freeze, Blizzard II and Sleep are useless and should have something done. However, rather than entirely proposing their full removal, I propose a few... uh. Transformations. to make them better.

Scathe: Just a flat 200 potency. No benefits from Astral Fire, and doesn't maintain Umbral Ice. This would make it so that if a player is stuck on the move, it can and will get the job done alongside Thundercloud. That said, Enhanced Scathe should remain, a rare doubling that encourages you to use it whilst you're stuck moving... or grant a chance that upon hit, it triggers Thundercloud, though it'd be a rather high chance, like 50%.

Freeze: Make it Flare potency (so 260) with Flare drop off with a high MP cost. Simple as that. Oh, and no manual targeting. Bind is fine tho.

Blizzard II: This one is tricky because it feels bad, and shouldn't exist. That said, increasing it to 80 potency would allow it to match the base potency of Fire II, giving it a purpose in pre-Blizzard III AOE rotations.

Sleep: ...Okay, you got me. This one shouldn't exist. However, I instead suggest Temper from classic Final Fantasy 1 instead, to grant an extra DPS boost, ala Enochian but without the maintenance. Perhaps a 10% damage increase for 30s and a 90s cooldown? Maybe also give a 5% damage boost to those around you when you use it? I dunno.

The bad is that the abilities she's suggesting to replace Scathe, Freeze, Blizzard II and Sleep with are depreciated abilities that clash with Black Mage both thematically and gameplay wise, from an era where Thaumaturges were HEALERS and Conjurers were Red Mages in all but name and lore. Thaumaturges ever since 1.2 have reverted to the Black Mage identity of "damage" elements, the Fire, the Ice and the Thunder, and abandoning its kinda void mage identity of 1.0. That's probably why they locked up Mumuepo. Gameplay wise, when trying to buff a Pure DPS class, you try to increase their damage or make it easier to inflict damage, not try to mess with the identity to make it "viable". In fact, this is the very issue that Monks are feeling at the moment, but a few people in this very thread are failing to realize the ramifications of what they're doing. Messing with a job's identity for the sake of improving it may work for those who only care about the job's usability, but has a high risk of alienating people who have supported that job since the beginning.

You need to improve the Black Mage on the merits of its DPS, not by giving it utility that may or may not clash with its gameplay style. The only kind of utility the class should have is either its pure power or a self-serving buff that happens to make other DPSes hit harder. And that's it.

[Kabooa]

TL;DR: Make Scathe, Freeze and Blizzard II killy, and replace Sleep with a self buff.

I don't see those changes affecting the current status of Freeze and Blizzard 2.

For those two, I'd suggest this.

Blizzard 2: Enemies hit by this spell are inflicted with Shatter. They will take additional damage from the first Damaging spell that hits them, at a reduced rate when that spell is an ally's.

Freeze: Turned into an ability.
Duration: 15 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Radius: 10y
Effect: Enemies within the area effect are afflicted with Heavy and Shatter for as long as they remain inside.

Black Mages gain a Caster friendly boost as well as a personal damage increase. Blizzard 2 and Freeze both gain a definitive spot in the spell arsenal.

[EllieShadeflare]

I don't see those changes affecting the current status of Freeze and Blizzard 2.

For those two, I'd suggest this.

Blizzard 2: Enemies hit by this spell are inflicted with Shatter. They will take additional damage from the first Damaging spell that hits them, at a reduced rate when that spell is an ally's.

Freeze: Turned into an ability.
Duration: 15 seconds
Cooldown: 60 seconds
Radius: 10y
Effect: Enemies within the area effect are afflicted with Heavy and Shatter for as long as they remain inside.

Black Mages gain a Caster friendly boost as well as a personal damage increase. Blizzard 2 and Freeze both gain a definitive spot in the spell arsenal.

You didn't read the full proposal for the two skills? Freeze would become the Umbral Ice "Fire II/Flare," and would build to Umbral Ice II/III while still providing good AoE coverage. After all, in the ideal situation of using it, Flare would wreck your opportunity of having Umbral Ice III ready for Blizzard IV then Fire III, since you'd be forced to Transpose into UI.

In all fairness however, the Shatter idea sounds nice as a trait for Blizzard II once it gets obsolete, but Bind is already fine for most AoE situations for the two of them. That said, if only Blizzard II had more of a point than--

My problem is that B2 is a Point-Blank-AoE, so unless you change it to be a targeted AoE you'd be losing uptime running in and out of trash mobs trying to hit them and avoid AoEs.

Not considering the fact that you B2 is inferior to F2 in a nearly all PvE situations.

Okay, THIS. All of THIS.

[Kabooa]

You didn't read the full proposal for the two skills? Freeze would become the Umbral Ice "Fire II/Flare," and would build to Umbral Ice II/III while still providing good AoE coverage. After all, in the ideal situation of using it, Flare would wreck your opportunity of having Umbral Ice III ready for Blizzard IV then Fire III, since you'd be forced to Transpose into UI.

The UI3 might make it worthwhile, but I'm too lazy to do the math. Assuming it stayed 3.whatever cast speed, I think that might have it be slightly better than just prioritizing B4/T4 and then going straight into AF3.

Though, if the math showed it coming out as neutral or better, the other issue it presents is that it might simply be better to just stay in UI3 for Freeze Spam. That's the primary reason B2 got nerfed, because at 100 potency, the quicker cast, infinite spam B2 outpaced F2.

Strictly speaking, while Ice phase not having high damage options is pretty meh, I'd rather Fire be grossly higher than Ice, and Ice serving to set up / buff that phase.

[EllieShadeflare]

Though, if the math showed it coming out as neutral or better, the other issue it presents is that it might simply be better to just stay in UI3 for Freeze Spam. That's the primary reason B2 got nerfed, because at 100 potency, the quicker cast, infinite spam B2 outpaced F2.

'
Even by buffing the potency of Freeze to be 260 like Flare, it would never be as powerful as Flare for one simple reason: Astral Fire III. Certainly, Blizzard II was in a spot where it was hitting harder than Fire II (despite Fire II having 180 potency when you apply Astral Fire III) because of its sheer speed. Flare and Freeze already have the same cast speed, and the difference between their full practical potencies is quite vast. I don't think it's a problem to raise Freeze's potency to make it viable in a rotation.

[Remedi]

I'm afraid I'll have to say that new spells are usually something they add during an expansion what we need are ttweaks to skills which are more likely to come.
It'll be already a miracle if they'll change the effect of our less used skills asking for completely new skills is too much of a stretch

[EllieShadeflare]

I'm afraid I'll have to say that new spells are usually something they add during an expansion what we need are ttweaks to skills which are more likely to come.
It'll be already a miracle if they'll change the effect of our less used skills asking for completely new skills is too much of a stretch

Considering Scholar got Miasma II, and both ACN jobs got back Sustain... and PvP classes gained new abilities each, I don't think it's as much a stretch as you may think, but I do see your point.

[Remedi]

They got skills they HAD back those were not new skills, there's a huge difference

1.0 skills are completely lost they would've to recreate them from scratch

as for PVP they got skills already in their arsenal they got nothing really new

[magnanimousCynic]

My problem is that B2 is a Point-Blank-AoE, so unless you change it to be a targeted AoE you'd be losing uptime running in and out of trash mobs trying to hit them and avoid AoEs.

Not considering the fact that B2 is inferior to F2 in a nearly all PvE situations.