Black Mage - Aspect Mastery

[JustinHiryu]

Shurma, I will support your report as a bug. I actually found this out myself earlier today and brought this to the attention of those on Novice Network. Many of the players there agreed that Flare should be able to be cast for free under full stacks of Umbral Ice due to Aspect Mastery. There are no exceptions listed under Aspect Mastery, Flare, or the Astral/Umbral effects that say it should function otherwise. However, let me make it clear how it should work just in case someone posts here without a full understanding of all things involved:

1.Flare is not a non-aspected spell. Flare, in its description, says that it does Fire aspected damage.
2.Flare has the added effect of getting rid of any stacks of Umbral Ice and giving you full stacks of Astral Fire.
3.Casting Flare while having Umbral Hearts reduces the mp cost of Flare by 1/3 and removes all Umbral Hearts. This is dealing with Umbral Hearts alone.
4.Aspect Mastery states that while you have full stacks of either Astral Fire or Umbral Ice, casting a spell with the opposite element will cost no mp.
5.Flare absolutely has an mp cost. It says 10,000 mp on the tooltip, which we know as all of our mp. What most people do not know, is that there is actually a minimum mp cost for the spell. You must have 1000 mp or more. Either way, Flare has an mp cost.

Now, let me state this case. Casting Blizzard 3, Freeze, or using Umbral Soul enough times will give you full stacks of Umbral Ice. I can cast Fire, Fire 2, and Fire 3 for free. They are all fire aspected spells, and I have confirmed their costing no mp under Aspect Mastery. However, if I have full stacks of Umbral Ice and then cast Flare, if I have any Umbral Hearts, Flare will cost 1/3 mp and remove my hearts. If I have no Umbral Hearts, it will cost all of my mp. The issue is not how Umbral Hearts affect Flare. The issue is how Aspect Mastery affects Flare. With no tooltip or anything to state Flare as an exception, Flare should, by all intents and purposes, under full Umbral Ice, COST NO MP. Period. Our rotations, or how anyone else feels how we should play the job is not an issue here. In fact, what anyone else here has to say in reference to how the job should be played or if something is OP or not is irrelevant. Those opinions belong on another thread. What IS relevant here, is the possible bug we have found. Nothing else.