Thread: BLU MAGE...PATCH 5.1...HMMMMMM?

Originally Posted by Brightshadow

And for those that defend this limited design, please be honest with yourselves how often have you used BLU since it launched...

Just as a note first lol, I would have preferred both (limited and normal == advanced job) or just normal. I also think I'd be more okay with exclusively limited if they were titled things that weren't iconic. Shepherd not beastmaster, not blue mage, etc, but calling them iconic things that have clear images and associated concepts (for the most part) makes it rough for me to be happy they're limited- though I'll try to detail how I might have still enjoyed blue mage even if it was exclusively limited.

Personally I see Blue Mage having the unique potential to break the game into submission for those who want to casually experience everything they could have/would have never done before. All of the raids, EX / Savage content they missed, the deep areas of the deep dungeons, the maps they couldn't do solo, the diadem, the Eureka- allowing a large background of players to enjoy old content (time, skill, their main job not soloing very well, etc). Allowing you to put those areas on farm for gear, story, and just general experience (a lot of really awesome environment fights are in those contents that a super casual person might not get to experience). In terms of a general balance statement that'd be any content blue mage has equal level to, and a good selection of skills, should be able to solo that content. Part of getting there I had liked the idea that the more skills you collect the more base powerlevel you have (such that if you want to group up early you can, to get those strong skills earlier, or if you want to go solo you just go in order of difficulty and you'll basically 'gear up' your blue mage- and this also makes all skills even the skills you'll never use more valuable).

Obviously blue mage isn't clearly going that way yet, which is the way I hope blue mage goes IF it MUST remain limited exclusively. Without that feature, and made a bit less luster that the kit is a lot of repeating specific skills, I have a much harder time personally seeing value out of a limited design concept (which of course is disheartening since I was excited for a Blue Mage main job).

So just wanted to say I could see a potential value. Since you could equip blue mage with absolutely ridiculous spells needed to combat some of the enemies presented, and also just for the fun of it (a lot of the wild spells for blue mage are more spam due to low % and likely ignored, would like to see different mechanics around stuff like that). Also hopefully add new glue and mechanic to make it fun to mix and play around more, new instant casts, cooldowns, charges, a lot more spell interactions, perhaps new currency/job mechanic concepts- I feel blue mage needs a tighter "play experience"). Like a spell I've been suggesting for blue mage to get that solo god status was a skill called Molt. Molt (name up for change) would allow the blue mage to shed their skin displacing attacks off blue mage onto the molt, including markers (so you could dodge stack mechanics and more, things that could easily kill even overpowered unsynced jobs). Might even be able to add an attack component to it like all cone attacks will be cast by your molt as well (like that moth boss, sort of). That just being one of many potential skills that could let blue mage defy the idea of a content being impossible to solo. Mighty Guard could go under similar treatment, especially as it feels worse now that actual tanks don't suffer similar costs (damage loss is removed, and the damage reduction being a passive skill).

Of course if Blue Mage takes the spot as 'a casual's explosive journey through nearly all of FFXIV (blu not allowed into 'new content')', then another spot should be considered if any other limited is to be made- so any other new limited jobs would need to have different spot. Hopefully with job mechanics to make it more connected/flowing like a job would be to play, which is why I was trying to say trading card games and diablo affix building before. Making other limited jobs have different goals, as duplication of that one value (solo god king) I think wouldn't be that helpful. Also I still think there could be a lot of value out of making advanced jobs. Advanced jobs being jobs that are both limited, behave uniquely, and have normal (DF) components- so like blue mage levels much faster, has a huge customize-able kit outside of current content, but also has a specific set of skills made just for DF (like how jobs have a special kit for PvP vs PvE).

So here I thought beastmaster would have a shepherd DoL component, of like animal husbandry, being able to level in a DoL fashion, decent leveling speed but they'd spend time training their partner for battle. Perhaps in the open world they can have their hand trained pet and a wild monster out, making them more potent open world, but of course in DF they'd have their balanced trained pet (in terms of customization I could see a number of options, like even creating non-combat helpful pets, but of course for DF the pet will need more tightly balanced options a bit like hunter in WoW, for DF QA purposes). Puppet master would be able to craft unique smart minions (have varying levels of interaction), have a performance feature (like bard's)*, must craft their puppet (for DF balance /option must be a bit stricter for QA), and of course can DF with it. *I think it could be quite fun, maybe (potential for error... lol), to be able to program your pets into a set of actions like some of the puzzle games you might find online (like this one: https://lightbot.com/).

Then you have a DoL battle job, a DoH battle job, both coming with unique content (crafting, doing puzzles that perhaps have to do with story- like you're developing AI to build something, gathering and raising animals that can help you as well as produce items), and their DF components being strictly balanced to not be a walking mess (although SE needs to make sure the pet AI can respond super fast, ghosting damage and being ignored by your pet like summoner does sometimes can be frustrating). Now you could scrape out the DF part of both puppetmaster and beastmaster but then I think you should also take out their name, else (I think) you damage their nostalgia as you put them at the 'special table' at the wedding ceremony lol. So I could still see the above two jobs (PUP/BSM) being fun as limited but then not call them those either, they're basically then just really weird DoL and weird DoH. I think using their nostalgic name should only be considered if they're not going to be 'main-able'.

Tl;dr (ish lol):

I could potentially see enjoying Blue Mage as exclusively limited even if always a bit bitter sweet and always wanting DF; although, I have some major issues with it at the moment and maybe that's just how it'll always be for me (I'm not trying to speak for everyone, I know some liked it). As of now I only use it to get free teleport tickets, when I feel like it (so not that often).

Also I would like blue mage more if it was an advanced job. I could also see enjoying limited jobs more / being okay and maybe excited if when they were added they weren't connected to nostalgia that has a specific imagery (jobs are jobs to be used in combat, it's hard to emotionally disconnect that especially when you don't want to "I wanted to main BLU"). Like SMN of 2.0 was actually a good job mechanically, but it really missed the nostalgia mark for me (like I enjoyed playing it but I greatly disliked looking at it, feeling "what happened guys...?" lol)- if it was called something else I'd have been like "this is perfect" but I never felt that because it didn't give me any of those feelings I had loved due to imagery conflict, though to SE's credit SMN is working hard to become that old nostalgia feeling (demi are great choices to add, every expansion is exciting to think what will be included, and I'm still greatly curious about the potential glamour system- the image is coming along quite well).