How to Fix Black Mage for Good

[Seraphor]

That's why I said "is ever useful" instead of "was ever useful". It used to be passable, but now more or less worthless. As for Sleep, I'm not a big fan of moves that are semi useful in a single place and virtually nowhere else. Sleep needs a rework or the boot.

New players join every day...

[GunksFoy]

New players join every day...

And as I said, even at low levels Scathe is useless. Or at the very least nigh useless. There are so few AoEs at that level that you will rarely ever use it. And you should have SC always since it's a cross role, and the odds you need major movement more than once in 60s at level 30 and below are low. Scathe is so bad that if it didn't proc it would probably be better just to not use it because the movement will take less time than the GCD and you can start casting a real spell sooner. If it procs it would be fine, but that's a big if given the low chance.

EDIT: I'm not saying FOR SURE it would, but the dps change would be absolutely negligible at that level anyways, and I would prefer new BLMs learn to better utilize their abilitiies (SC) and learn to slidecast than get in the habit of using Scathe.

[zuzu-bq]

A good way of fixing it is playing it well.

Now to fix the view that people has on the job being bad post 4.2, that's truly really hard to fix.

[Kabooa]

A good way of fixing it is playing it well.

Now to fix the view that people has on the job being bad post 4.2, that's truly really hard to fix.

Bad's subjective.

Technically none of the jobs are bad. They're just inferior to other choices.

[zuzu-bq]

Bad's subjective.

Technically none of the jobs are bad. They're just inferior to other choices.

When something is inferior in most if not all possible cases and combinations, it's just objectively bad. And that's what people think of BLM. I do agree with your statement though.

On the B4 subject: It's a badly designed spell, yes. But it doesn't generate big issues unless you're pre 70. So It doesn't really need to be changed, even though it would be cool if it was.

[Zerathor]

"those skills"
Sleep is still a highly useful niche spell for PoTD and Eureka, and general messing around in the open world. I'm fine with jobs having some abilities that are quality of life spells that don't have use in end tier raiding

Scathe has its place. Scathe is your smack the 1% you failed to finish on an add spell/smack boss before he becomes untargetable/you somehow really messed up and have to run a very long distance without swift/triple cast.

Blizzard II is pretty much worthless other than its bind for solo content, and it will remain as such because if you really wanted to AOE in UI, freeze is better.

cont.

[Zerathor]

Freeze. I'm going to help you half of the way here. make a macro (/ac "Freeze" <t>) and it will now cast freeze directly on your target, tada. the fact that it can be ground placed actually allows you to potentially min max on add spawn locations/ boss respawn locations after becoming untargetable by getting some precasted damage in the moment it spawns if you have it finish directly as they spawn (this is only extreme min maxing, but it is a gain if you're in UI because free gcd) Freeze could use a potency increase, but i doubt it could compete with b3 b4 f3 flare flare ever for the gcd slot.

"umbral hearts"
the one extra f4 you're downplaying so much is 400-800 dps contribution over the fight. that's a lot, and whoever is telling you to not use b4 should be slapped. also b4 helps with by padding your rotation time for lining up foul, as well as help your UI cycle go smoother without downtime

cont

[Zerathor]

"damage over contribution"
the issue with high % blm vs low % blm is there is a huge gap compared to other jobs in skill. like 50th % smn likely knows what they're doing, but 50th % blm isn't using b4 for some reason and ogcd clipping every chance they can get. Use ogcd's after f3 or b3 when transitioning from AF or UI, use them after instant casts (along with potions) and ALWAYS.... use b4, (and of course never drop eno and use all your fouls) and you'll find your blm damage is greatly higher. blm damage is in a pretty good spot atm, especially depending on your party comp. when you play it properly, you'll be the best candidate for multiplier buffs to further increase the party's damage. Your role is to be the top damage and thus the best candidate to make utility jobs even more useful with their buffs, and they're filling that role pretty well.

job's potentials are balanced by what they're capable of, not what the average player is capable of.

[Seraphor]

And as I said, even at low levels Scathe is useless. Or at the very least nigh useless. There are so few AoEs at that level that you will rarely ever use it. And you should have SC always since it's a cross role, and the odds you need major movement more than once in 60s at level 30 and below are low. Scathe is so bad that if it didn't proc it would probably be better just to not use it because the movement will take less time than the GCD and you can start casting a real spell sooner. If it procs it would be fine, but that's a big if given the low chance.

I was referring to "Sleep needs a rework or the boot."
There's no need to remove a skill that's useful at low levels, just because it not worth using at higher levels.
Nothing is gained from doing so, but you make the levelling process more dull and tiresome.

[GunksFoy]

Snip

I see, my bad. But Sleep is very niche. There's no reason to use it in dungeons unless your healer is abysmal, and it also necessitates that you have a Paladin tank as Warrior and DRK will wake them up instantly. I could see SOME value in solo content, but any time you spent wasting on a sleep spell would have been better spent on a fire 1. If you get in a bad situation and are overwhelmed, sure, useful, but you could also just sprint away 99% of the time and come back. If you have a legitimate use case I'd love to hear it, and I'm open to having my mind changed about booting it. But it needs a rework, and I don't think I can be persuaded otherwise about that. Without one, it will forever be exempt from my hotbars.