Alright, I Did It. [Blue mage Review]

[Kalise]

It seems like many of the people who wanted BLU want both the iconic aspects of the job--learning magic from monsters--but also want it to fit exactly into the existing model for leveling jobs and learning skills so that it's not excluded from current content. I'm not sure it's possible to make both work.

To be honest, it's not all that impossible to make BLU work while still keeping its unique learning system intact.

I mean, the main issue with the current set up, is that a vast majority of BLU's actually good skills are tied behind low learn chances on Dungeons/Trials that aren't super simple to farm (I.e. Such as getting to level 70 and then just soloing dungeons like Pharos Sirius to get skills that are nice boosts). Meaning that the job feels bad and incomplete until you manage to luck out in this content that is well... Still party content so you still kind of want to be functional when you're farming it anyway...

So, the easiest solution, would be to have similar skills attainable through much less annoying means. Farming overworld mobs for learning spells is not so arduous, since, not only is it much more available, it can easily be done solo and isn't predicated on doing group content where you then have to deal with people expecting you to have skills X, Y or Z. Or at worst, being given the basic skills (Such as your damn filler skill, which currently is only obtained from dungeons or level 50 mobs) directly through the totems.

In addition, you can also adjust the job quests so instead of asking you to get useless skills like Blood Drain and Mind Blast (From a dungeon no less...) it asked you to get you know, the skills you'd be relying on such as 1000 Needles, Bad Breath or whatever new not garbage skills they implement that can be learned from the overworld.

See, the learning system for BLU isn't inherently as obtuse as it currently exists, no, it has been INTENTIONALLY DESIGNED that way. It was a conscious decision to put all the good spells locked away behind low % learn chance Dungeon/EX Trial kills, to make 90% of the total skills to be worthless trash, to have the core skills not be the ones you get from all the totems (You get 2 of them, but not all of them).

I don't know why they decided to do this, I can only assume they wanted to be like "SEE we TOLD you you wouldn't like how we'd HAVE to implement BLU!" but even then, that's still an asinine decision, when they could have just implemented it properly and gained a lot of popularity for the job where heck, much of their work is already done (Animations and names for skills already exist. Mechanics of skills already exist. They just have to add Blue Magic FX to them, and do some number adjusting and voila, they have a brand new Blue Magic spell)

[Huntrss]

For me, the issue is that if I go into Royal Menagerie as a DRK and didn't bother to do my level 70 job quest to get TBN, that's my fault.

If I try to queue as a BLU without a skill that I spent an hour spamming a dungeon for and getting screwed by RNG, that's...not necessarily my fault.

As long as there is an RNG element to learning the class abilities, you'll run into the issue where people are playing the game as designed (i.e., not trying to be cute and not equipping job stones or playing "ice mages") but still don't have the abilities that the game and other players expect you to have. So you take away the RNG and have Blue Mages learn all of their class skills from a trainer. So...what makes them different from any other mage class in the game?

Yes, RDM was changed. I main RDM, and I mostly like it, but I kind of miss the support aspect to the class. That's not possible, because FFXIV sticks to the holy trinity, so there's no real primarily support class. It seems like many of the people who wanted BLU want both the iconic aspects of the job--learning magic from monsters--but also want it to fit exactly into the existing model for leveling jobs and learning skills so that it's not excluded from current content. I'm not sure it's possible to make both work.

Believe me it's possible to to do it but the way you get totems for Blue kinda like that and go out hunting which if you played Hunter class in WoW you get the idea same effect except spells. Like I said Blue can heal, give up it's life to heal another but it can't Revive. a lot of people are going why can't revive me and here Red mage Reviving Everyone and healing too.

[Rosenoire]

Personally, I found farming overworld mobs for learning spells incredibly tedious after the 20th time watching a boar use Bristle and failing to learn it, which followed 45 minutes of grinding killer wespes in La Noscea only to either die or not learn the skill. I only got it after telling myself, "If I don't learn it this time I'm going to sleep, because this is annoying." But that's RNG for you.

I was pretty much over the RNG after my 108th run of SusanoEx with no dog, but at least that's optional content. Gating necessary job abilities behind RNG is a poor design. But if you get all of the skills from the job quests, like every other caster, then...you're like every other caster, only with blue artifact armor. Being wedded to the trinity of tank/healer/dps is also not optimal for a class that traditionally has been able to fill multiple roles.

I feel badly for people who really wanted BLU and got this. I just don't know that it's possible to implement the class in its iconic form from other Final Fantasy games within the framework of FFXIV.

[Blueyes]

Honestly, I believe the only reason why there are spells with such an abysmal learn rate is to slow down progression. If Blue Mage had access to all content, they could scrap the RNG entirely because there's actual content for it to do after collecting all of its spells. But since there is so little for Blue Mage to do, SE has intentionally given spells a low chance of being learned purely for the sake of keeping Blue Mage occupied when there's nothing else to do.

[Mortex]

Blue Mage his weapon is the ability Off Guard. And the 50 % passiv magic increase but yes he lacks a lot of stats from the weapon.

[Mortex]

Honestly, I believe the only reason why there are spells with such an abysmal learn rate is to slow down progression. If Blue Mage had access to all content, they could scrap the RNG entirely because there's actual content for it to do after collecting all of its spells. But since there is so little for Blue Mage to do, SE has intentionally given spells a low chance of being learned purely for the sake of keeping Blue Mage occupied when there's nothing else to do.

We did over 80 Garuda runs to learn feather rain. After 5 normals runs I did go on my 70 job to burst thought that rng fest. Took still over 3 hours

[Astarotha]

to most of the people saying it takes way too long to learn a skill i point you to my experience with blu in 11, where it took (and i shit you not) 18 HOURS to learn sandspin, a completely useless level 0 blu spell, the fact that mobs actually USE their skills in this game fairly frequently or are part of their phase scripts makes this so much better to learn things

[Kabooa]

to most of the people saying it takes way too long to learn a skill i point you to my experience with blu in 11, where it took (and i shit you not) 18 HOURS to learn sandspin, a completely useless level 0 blu spell, the fact that mobs actually USE their skills in this game fairly frequently or are part of their phase scripts makes this so much better to learn things

Yes, and FF11 is literally the game that has aged the poorest. :P

[Deceptus]

Honestly, I believe the only reason why there are spells with such an abysmal learn rate is to slow down progression. If Blue Mage had access to all content, they could scrap the RNG entirely because there's actual content for it to do after collecting all of its spells. But since there is so little for Blue Mage to do, SE has intentionally given spells a low chance of being learned purely for the sake of keeping Blue Mage occupied when there's nothing else to do.

And anyone with any common sense knew this was the entire reason for the RNG base for learning spells.

[Lambdafish]

So, the easiest solution, would be to have similar skills attainable through much less annoying means

Whether it was or wasn't possible before (I don't believe it is possible in way that would satisfy people more than what we have), it most certainly isn't possible now. To change current BLU in such a way would be an overhaul akin to making a brand new job, which I would rather they didn't do.