How BLU CAN be implemented in Content

[PatronasCharm]

Let's say SE hears the crowd and allows Blue Mages to join in current content, alongside roulettes etc., here's a simple solution:

-Pre-Determined "Base" Blue Magic sets for that content, that's balanced by the DEV team, and in-line with current DPS output but also has its own unique twang to its base-line Class of Magical Ranged DPS.

-Translation:

• 24 Base Blue Spells are granted to the Player for those "Activities" (Raid / Duty Finder / etc.) to the Blue Mages for that content.

-Have a Blue Magic Spell "Requirement (s)" in order to access these activities, sort of like an iLvl Requirement is needed to enter certain content.

Outside of activities, during "Solo" play, or any other content that BLU access with pre-built parties or the general premise of the Blue Mage: they can swap spells etc. pretty much what it is now.

Further Translation:

So from what I saw on the video, BLU doesn't have a rotation (I may be wrong) my perspective with BLU, though I am on board by the way it's being implemented, is the DEV team sort of testing the waters.

So with no rotation you just spam Blue Spells until enemy is dead. But again I may be wrong, there could in fact be a rotation.

So here's my take on the future of BLU for Content related to Roulettes / Party Environments:

Add a Blue Mage Specific Rotation:

Ability: "Scan" Determine Weakness

• Goblin Punch (Opener) >> [x2 Single Blue Spell] >> [Job Meter +]
  
• Bomb Toss (AoE) >> [x2 AoE Blue Spells] >> [Job Meter +]

List of Job Meter Finishers:

AoE's

• 1,000 Tonze Swing *Come on we all know how much we hate this move... lets use it against them!
• Gigaflare
• Of course the some of the ones from the Primal Fights

Enemy Debuffs for Raid Utility:

Zero-form Particle Beam: Inflicts Vulnerability up and stacks up to 5 times, equaling: 8%

-I'll come up with more later

*[GCD Blue Spells] Hard Hitting spells like: Jet Stream / Goblin Rush [Meter -]

*[GCD Raid Utility Spells] - Bad Breath / White Wind (AoE Heal) / Angel Whisper (AoE Raise all) << OH YEAH! j/k lol. But at least raise one target

• These Hard Hitting Spells Eat up some of the "Unbridled Knowledge Meter

[Unbridled Knowledge Meter 80%] >> Primal / Notorious Monster Ability [Meter Exhausted]

• Or the [Unbridled Knowledge Meter] Opens up a new rotation that's finisher is a "Primal / NM Ability"

-
Again, just a thought, and of course once we get to test it ourselves we'll see their vision.

---

Other Thoughts: [What could his Abilities be and how can they shape the current party play if added to a "Pre-Formed Party" to play content]

The Holy Trinity System and Beyond.

We already established it's a Magical Ranged DPS as a base...
---
So let's say, The current Blue Mage again is just a test phase sort of thing, where it's "Limited" but truthfully, SE could be thinking: "I'm not sure it could work with party play due to certain moves / abilities, it MAY work, but let's see the community run with it with pre-formed parties and go from there."

That could very well be the development team's current thought. So let's sort of speculate how the job can evolve from here.
---

Main Weapon: [Something]
WEAPON: Sub-Weapon "Cane"

-The Cane could have an additional bonus of learning Blue Magic the higher they go in iLvl-

When the job launches let's say the Blue Mage has the following abilities:

• "Learning" [Instant / ??] - Increases the likely chance to learn Blue Magic by 20%.
• Duration: 5 min. (Or it could be a quick one, 00:00:05)
  
  
• "Scan" [Instant / ?? / Duration 5s] - Scans target and finds weakness. Abilities with that weakness receive an increased potency of 5%.
  
  
• Diffusion [Instant / ??] - Next Blue Magic Enhancing Spell is granted to Party Members within range.
  
  
• Affinity Efflux [Instant / ??] Next Blue Magic Spell Potency is increased by 30%. If Enemy Weakness is exploited, the Potency of the spell is increased by 50%.
  
  
• "Unbridled Wisdom" [Instant / ?? / Duration: 14s] Allows the Blue Mage to cast any Unbridled Knowledge Blue Magic without the use of the gauge being full.
  
  
• Correlation [Instant / Until Deactivated] After using Scan, enemies of that family group will receive increased damage by its exploited weakness. Checkmate reduces the rate of learning Blue Magic.
  
  
• Under the effect of Checkmate Blue Magic Gauge is increased by an additional 5% per Blue Magic Cast.

(*Checkmate for me would be a fun "Solo" EXP play zerg thing, so if the player is killing an enemy group of the same family, they can kill them faster with the increased potency.)

*Just in case Blue Mage is given a meter, if they do I'd call it: "Unbridled Knowledge"

This can paint the picture of how powerful a Blue Mage could be in party play?

--


-Absolutely Ridiculous Thought........
--

Let the BLU mage determine its class depending on the spells it has during outside "Limited" play.

That way, the Blue Mage can be any class "Healer / DPS / Tank >> YES, tank"
--
How? Not sure, but maybe they can have a wide array of Enemy Abilities that are "Healing Magic" "Tank Based Magic" and or "General DPS"

-
If the Blue Mage has 15 of a certain category equipped, their Class changes with it.

That was just my thought lol; I know there's a good bit of BLU thread flying about. Still psyched and I am ready to delve into this FFXIV Blue Mage.

Thanks yall! Pat out.

[Hanayumi]

I would have to agree with devs in keeping BLU out of high endgame content, because yikes that would require soooo much balancing. But I dont see why they can't let blue mage queue up as at least a dps for other content.

[WellFooled]

I would have to agree with devs in keeping BLU out of high endgame content, because yikes that would require soooo much balancing. But I dont see why they can't let blue mage queue up as at least a dps for other content.

Other MMOs balance there games all the time with customization. It doesn't need to be in 100% balance in the ultimate sense, but just in a reasonable margin.

[AppleJinx]

Everyone loves to make it sound so simple "just come up with a predetermined set of skills lol." like I am sure the devs haven't thought about that at all. Also you are proposing this under the assumption that every blue mage queuing into content would have learned all of those predetermined skills beforehand and this is simply never the case if you've been playing this game for half a day.

[Hanayumi]

Everyone loves to make it sound so simple "just come up with a predetermined set of skills lol." like I am sure the devs haven't thought about that at all. Also you are proposing this under the assumption that every blue mage queuing into content would have learned all of those predetermined skills beforehand and this is simply never the case if you've been playing this game for half a day.

I dunno... I mean you can technically queue up as a class without your soul stone, or queue up without doing your jobs quests... but you rarely see it happen, most people just have the common sense of knowing "oh i guess shouldnt do that, huh?" So why not a blue mage? But I'm talking about dungeons and such, cake walks, its pretty damn hard to fail that stuff... I would have to agree to lock blue mage out of high end stuff like savage or ex, mostly because it would be hard work on devs to balance things out. >.<

[Sploda]

I dunno... I mean you can technically queue up as a class without your soul stone, or queue up without doing your jobs quests... but you rarely see it happen, most people just have the common sense of knowing "oh i guess shouldnt do that, huh?" So why not a blue mage? But I'm talking about dungeons and such, cake walks, its pretty damn hard to fail that stuff... I would have to agree to lock blue mage out of high end stuff like savage or ex, mostly because it would be hard work on devs to balance things out. >.<

Except it isn't, all they had to do was tie the Skill farming into Job Quests, and balance the skills like any other Job. That would've been satisfying for the majority of us who wanted BLU in game, instead a lot of us are going to be passing on or begrudgingly playing this version instead. Blue Magic in other games is more than viable for normal use, and the example of "oh no lvl 5 death didn't kill it, BLU ruined" is false, cuz most bosses are immune to status effects in most FF games with BLU anyway. It's simply the lack of desire to deviate from the FF XI BLU, and as such they basically just ported it over and said it's "solo focused" but also decided that you'd need pre-mades to do any group content (some of which holds some of your skills), meaning that you can't play solo anyway, and with how things are looking it'll never be at the same level as standard jobs, always lagging behind to avoid being added into current raid content.

[AppleJinx]

I dunno... I mean you can technically queue up as a class without your soul stone, or queue up without doing your jobs quests... but you rarely see it happen, most people just have the common sense of knowing "oh i guess shouldnt do that, huh?" So why not a blue mage? But I'm talking about dungeons and such, cake walks, its pretty damn hard to fail that stuff

That's a false parallel. For one you don't acquire other jobs skills through rng. There are more incentives to progress through other job's job quests because you unlock skills guaranteed, gears that you might've wanted for glamour as well as lore if you care about it. Despite all this though most people in df still only use one or two buttons out of their entire kit only with blue mage, people would have a legit excuse for why they won't have certain skills.

[Sylve]

I dunno... I mean you can technically queue up as a class without your soul stone, or queue up without doing your jobs quests... but you rarely see it happen, most people just have the common sense of knowing "oh i guess shouldnt do that, huh?" So why not a blue mage? But I'm talking about dungeons and such, cake walks, its pretty damn hard to fail that stuff... I would have to agree to lock blue mage out of high end stuff like savage or ex, mostly because it would be hard work on devs to balance things out. >.<

Because a level 70 Archer is still a functioning class. It has a rotation that is missing end skills and its damage would subpar as a result, but *functional*.

A Blue Mage at 70 who just leeched off FATEs or some other method of levelling that never exposed them to learning a new skill would have exactly zero skills. Or whatever basic attack BLUs will start off with.

Basically, take a Monk and just spam Bootshine on a level 70 mob.
That is the concern the Devs have, and I believe it to be a valid one. If you took 4 base classes into a 4 man dungeon that were geared appropriately, the run CAN succeed. It would be hard and a bit of a slog, but doable since those classes have the basic core skills of their Role. But try the same with those same classes using only the very first skill usable at level 1 and its mechanically impossible.
That's the comparison. A base class at 70 retains the core of the Jobs role rotations. A Blue Mage has no built in core and relies on learning and setting skills on its own.

Also, The way they described this Limited Job system makes it sounds far more like a beta test than an actual 'mechanic'.
Which makes a great degree of sense to me. Having the ability to create a custom skillset is indeed a nightmare to balance. That's a lot of different skill combinations to thoroughly test inhouse. I feel more like they've opted to essentially outsource the testing of Blue Mages to us.
They can easily collect live data of skill usages and adjust them in a way that allows for any and all combinations to achieve a similar result.
If one particular set of skills ended up as the one that had the highest DPS by a noticeable margin, that would be the only accepted skillset for Blue Mages. Prospective new Blue Mages would then simply look up a guide, get only the required skills for this 'cookie-cutter' skillset and ignore all the rest.

They know that Players can be extremely creative in ways they never considered. So why not let us, the Players, provide the data in a way that doesn't just explode the raiding scene?

Nothing is stopping them from deciding to move Blue Mages out of the Limited category and into the wider world of content once they feel they've achieved balance.
Further additions to such a Limited category could well be a true Summoner, though with a different name to differentiate it from the DoT version.

It allows the Developers to get truly creative with Jobs without needing to fear for endgame balance. Once they have the live data to make it competitive in endgame content, they can lift the Limited tag and let us go nuts. That can only be good for the game.

[JBee]

Because a level 70 Archer is still a functioning class. It has a rotation that is missing end skills and its damage would subpar as a result, but *functional*.

A Blue Mage at 70 who just leeched off FATEs or some other method of levelling that never exposed them to learning a new skill would have exactly zero skills. Or whatever basic attack BLUs will start off with.

Basically, take a Monk and just spam Bootshine on a level 70 mob.

That is the concern the Devs have, and I believe it to be a valid one.

This is a very good point, and I agree with the Devs in it being a valid one.

1 - 70 ARC would have no songs, no dots, and more. I would 100% kick without a shred of guilt if they were unable or unwilling to equip their job stone.
2 - 70 BLU with no abilities, same thing - I would absolutely kick if they are not able to do their job in the content, as above.
3 - 70 MNK with bootshine only. This would be harder; for me, I don't think I would know they were only doing that one skill over and over, or if I did, I wouldn't realize it for a pretty far pace along. If I did and someone refused to fully participate - I don't care if they are good or bad, but if they straight up don't even try - then I would kick, yes.

I don't like freeloaders - as long as you participate and try, I couldn't care less if you were great or terrible. That goes for any job at any level - and Blue Mage is no exception.

If the developers really, REALLY wanted to make sure that didn't happen - they could easily put in restrictions for the queues. Minimum ilvl for all dungeons (be very liberal and inclusive, but don't let people show up in level 10 gear to a level 47 dungeon); Minimum quest fulfillments (maybe halfway through the level 70 dungeon list, require level 70 job quest complete); require job stones to be equipped for dungeons higher than level 30, unless in a preformed party (if you choose to make the game a challenge - then you should absolutely have that option - but not at the expense of others who are uninterested in your self-imposed restrictions); minimum/required abilities learned/equipped for Blue Mage (either they have the core stuff to do their job, or they need to go get it and not be a drain to the group).

[PatronasCharm]

Everyone loves to make it sound so simple "just come up with a predetermined set of skills lol." like I am sure the devs haven't thought about that at all. Also you are proposing this under the assumption that every blue mage queuing into content would have learned all of those predetermined skills beforehand and this is simply never the case if you've been playing this game for half a day.

True Strike on your behalf, I see where you're coming from, it would be dumb to hand a new ability to someone who hasn't even learned it; but there could always be a "Access to Duty Finder will unlock after unlocking..." such and such skill
"Goblin Punch," (as an example.)

I was just throwing in some fun ideas. Yeah, saying something is easier said then done; but having three months + of data with BLU being capped at 50, they could easily gather up enough data eventually to see what could and couldn't work in a Duty Finder instance.

Regardless of anything, it's going to be fun watching tons of BLUs flood the early zones and be in the crowd to try to learn new spells /abilities! Bring on "Frightful Roar"

Let's also bring on Ability / Spell perks ahahaha… one can wish.